


if i follow you into the unknown

by perennial



Category: Frozen 2 - Fandom, Sneedronningen | The Snow Queen - Hans Christian Andersen
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Non-Canon Relationship, hans gets a redemption arc, i make a stab at getting this franchise to resemble the snow queen fairy tale for once, in which..., jennifer lee can still fight me but i've calmed down a bit, salty frozen margarita: redux, sweet dumb baby idiots fall in love, the squad takes a road trip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:07:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21752728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perennial/pseuds/perennial
Summary: There isn’t a trace of the boy left. He is broad-shouldered and weatherworn, strong from the labor camp, all politesse discarded. Rough living doesn’t bother him; he has spent years sleeping on rock and in mud. His own family wouldn’t know him if they stumbled across his path. He is counting on it fooling the searchers who are assuredly hunting him.
Relationships: Anna/Kristoff (Disney), Elsa/Hans (Disney)
Comments: 175
Kudos: 332





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> AND WE'RE BACK i honestly can't believe it, i kind of hoped this day would never come
> 
> of note: 
> 
> this is a rewrite. it's not a fix-it fic. i liked this movie well enough - i didn't find the elemental spirits and ahtohallan and northuldra storylines particularly exciting or clear, but they didn't give me a rage stroke like f1 did, so i'm ignoring them altogether.
> 
> both movies were bound and determined to sugarcoat agnarr and iduna's TERRIBLE parenting as shown in f1, which was a little rage-inducing but i'm rolling with it because it serves my purposes here.
> 
> this story has no connection to the fix-it i wrote for f1, but that fic stands as my headcanon for how everything resolved in all things sans hans.
> 
> ETA: for those of you who might prefer a russian translation, it’s [here](https://ficbook.net/readfic/8936558)! thank your translator ♡

Once Hans is moved from prison to the labor camp he stops sending the letters. If anyone was reading them, they'd have shown up by now. He focuses his energy solely on escaping.

Prison is many things: a cesspool of stinking, filthy criminals and cold-hearted guards; the final home of those among the worst the world has to offer; a pride-breaker. Nowhere in the world are there more accumulated secrets. Gossip is currency. Knowledge is leverage. He has plenty of both to trade.

It takes him ten months: to dig the tunnel, to chart his course, to grow his beard, to steal some money from his jailers, to collect enough intelligence with which to bribe his cellmates. And then, like frost in the sun—

Gone.

*

He stays off the roads and out of the towns. Food is scavenged from the forest—nuts, berries, mushrooms—and from farms along the route—apples and squash, nothing that would be missed from this season's rich harvest.

He follows the waterways, walking or swimming when he can. He takes ferries when the water is too dangerous to cross and averts his face from eyes that might recognize or remember later. When he does cross paths with other people, they take him for a tramp. Ironically, though he still wears the princely clothes he was thrown into prison wearing, all they can see is the dirt. _You wear your heart on the outside now,_ the prison warden had jeered, looking at his stained jacket—three long years ago, just hours before the trade that would change everything.

There isn't a trace of the boy left. He is broad-shouldered and weatherworn, strong from the labor camp, all politesse discarded. Rough living doesn't bother him; he has spent years sleeping on rock and in mud. His own family wouldn't know him if they stumbled across his path. He is counting on it fooling the searchers who are assuredly hunting him.

The countryside is caught up in the full sweep of autumn. The more northward he journeys, the more golden and red the world becomes. It's beautiful, though he worries the nights will soon be too cold for comfort. He doesn't dare risk a campfire. He watches the sky slowly become more visible through the abscissing trees. Geese travel in huge flocks or single-digit families, all in V-formation, pointing him forward.

*

The ice eagle finds him on what he thinks is the thirty-third day. When he realizes what it is, he isn't sure whether he is more exultant or afraid.

She's looking for him.

Finally.

*

He skirted Arendelle City somewhere around the nineteenth day, but they still manage to locate him less than a week after the ice eagle's appearance. He lays on top of a rocky bluff and watches their advance. There are approximately fifty soldiers, which is flattering, albeit terrifying, due to knowing whom every last weapon will be pointing at if they find him. He sees a large man on a reindeer who doesn't look like a soldier. He doesn't see the queen.

He has no intention of being caught. There are ways to keep the advantage, in spite of fifty soldiers. If he can avoid them until darkness falls, he can sneak into the camp and into the queen's tent with no one the wiser. They'll be expecting him to be hiding or running, not infiltrating their temporary stronghold.

She must be here. She _must_.

*

He runs as fast as he can. Noise doesn't matter, leaving a trail doesn't matter, only speed.

He can hear them in the undergrowth, charging after him—and gaining. This is a landscape he doesn't know and he nearly runs off a bluff twice before reeling back. Every mistake loses him lead time and ground, but he's not thinking as clearly as he would if he weren't running for his life.

He hadn't factored in ice. At least, not this sort of ice, though the ice eagle should have tipped him off.

Lungs bursting, he veers toward the base of a bluff that can't be climbed without a set of hands. Twenty ice hounds burst into the clearing as he scales the rock wall. Half of them split off, presumably to cut him off at the top. He can hear shouts in the distance.

Adrenaline ushers him up the bluff in half the time it would have taken him otherwise. Flashes of the ice hounds are visible as they fight their way up the slope. Encouraged, he puts on a burst of speed that carries him well out of the hearing range of any hounds or soldiers.

The forest is thickly wooded. He stops to catch his breath in the shelter of a copse of golden trees and bushes the color of blood. He doesn't have a clue where he is in relation to the camp.

Without warning, there's a rustle on the other side of the bushes, a ring of steel — and the sheltering wall of leaves collapses.

And there they are. Anna: wielding a sword, shock widening her eyes and forming her mouth into an O. Elsa—

He is airborne and slammed against a rock surface before he registers that it's happening. Then, just as suddenly, he's freezing and paralyzed. He looks across the clearing, into the queen's fierce blue eyes, then down at himself. She has thrown a blast of ice at him and glued him to a huge rock slab.

Despite the circumstances he has to fight a satisfied smile. He knew she had to be here. It's _him_ , after all.

The big non-soldier stands beside her, as well as his reindeer. On her other side is her sister, gone white as milk.

Soldiers run up and, as anticipated, start pointing crossbows and swords at him. The copse churns with green suits and fills with shouted orders and threats. They can't reach his hands to handcuff him, icebound as he is. The non-soldier reclaims what is evidently his sword from the princess. Hans watches the queen take her sister's hand and bend her head toward her to ask a question. He watches Anna's lips say, _I didn't think we'd actually find him._

An older man enters the clearing. There's a break in the noise, enough to hear the queen greet him by name—"Mattias," she says, then the chaos swallows her up again.

Mattias, it appears, is a general of some importance. With his arrival the platoon regains a semblance of order. There are still fifty-plus weapons pointed at Hans—Anna got her hands on a crossbow, which makes him more than a little nervous—but the shouting stops.

He expects Mattias to conduct the interrogation, so it's gratifying when the queen, who has barely glanced at him, finally looks his way. Her face is hard. "You're a long way from your mud pit, Prisoner Westergaard."

"So good to see you both, Your Majesty. Your Highness," he says, emphasizing Anna's title as a question, not hiding his surprise at her presence.

The princess scowls at him. "What of it?"

"I would have thought one of you would stay in Arendelle."

Anna starts to cross her arms, then remembers she is holding a crossbow. "You going to go stage a coup while we're away?"

He is almost annoyed. Have they learned nothing? What if one of them dies here? What if both do?

He keeps his voice level. "Perhaps it's for the best. What I have to say concerns both of you."

One of Anna's eyebrows shoots up. "Oh? This was all a cry for attention, was it? What do you plan to do, plea for a pardon?"

The queen is already turning away. Her general says, "Save your breath, Westergaard. You'll get an audience once you've been shipped back down south, for all the good it will do."

"Queen Elsa!" Hans roars. The queen is startled into halting. She turns slowly. The eyes she locks on him are blazing, but he doesn't have time to be afraid of her freezing fire.

"Your parents are alive," he says, "and I know where they are."


	2. Chapter 2

Her eyes don't even flicker. She shakes her head in irritation. "Lock him up," she tells the general.

"It's true!" Hans shouts at her. He summons all the truth he can into his voice. "I heard it from a man who sailed with your parents on their last voyage. He said they went far beyond the Southern Sea, but the ship was sunk there by the captain to cover up for their disappearance. He lied to protect himself."

Anna says uncertainly, "Elsa?"

The queen's voice is flat. "My parents are dead and you are a proven liar."

"I’m not lying. And they aren't dead."

General Mattias marches up to the rock and holds his sword point to Hans' neck. As though another weapon pointing at him is going to make a difference. "If this is true, why is this the first you are telling us such precious information?"

"I did! I _tried!_ " He looks at the queen. "I sent you letters for _two years_. They were obviously disregarded." He doesn't miss the guilt that spasms across Anna's face.

With a little questioning, which the queen picks up and amplifies once she realizes Anna really does know something, the princess confesses.

His first letter had been a plea for pardon. He had been cautious lest others read it, simply promising information the sisters would surely want. As time had passed he grew more desperate and bold and by the time two years passed, he was outlining the whole truth in every missive, as well as the plan he was formulating in relation to what he had learned. Anna had received the first letter, read it, and destroyed it; then she had destroyed all the rest without ever reading them.

The queen is still cold as marble. "You saved my life from Weselton's men and tried to kill me less than a day later. Do you really expect me to believe a single word that comes out of your mouth?"

"Your Majesty. If I were in your shoes I wouldn't listen either. There's no reason you should trust me." He takes a deep breath. Carefully, carefully. _Humble. Impassioned._ "But what I'm telling you is _true_. Your Majesty, Your Highness, every country in the world knows what I did to you. I'll go down in history as the mad prince who tried to murder his way to a crown. And I was mad—I was everything they've called me. Unhinged. Insane. Sociopathic. I humbly submit that I am not that man anymore.

"I know my sentence and I accept it. Before they execute me, I want to make up for what I did to you. I'd like to go to the grave knowing I did something good at the end. This is all I have to offer. For your sake and your parents' sakes, please accept it, as my deepest, most heartfelt apology."

Anna's face is a study in emotion. The queen's expression doesn't change.

"What a pretty speech. How long have you been practicing it?"

He looks at her—slight and straight-backed and confident, self-assurance resting in her eyes, a queen in full control of the deadliest power he has ever encountered—and can't stifle a grin. "Four months."

Her eyes flicker, at that.

He holds her gaze. "Every word is true." He looks at Anna. _Please believe me._

Anna is frowning. "You want us to believe you've changed."

"Not changed. _Healed_ ," and with that the queen's head jerks back. He watches her, picking his words carefully. "I wasn't born a monster. I got lost. It was like—poison. And I gave into it. It got a footing and rotted me all the way to the core. It was a long time before I… grew back. But I _did_."

The queen looks unsettled and uncertain and for the first time he's hopeful. Anna looks pensive, if wary.

"I'm trying to prove it," he tells the sisters. "And the way I'm going to do that is by finding your parents."

He watches them conduct a wordless conversation. His heart is pounding in his ears. They're silent and staring for so long he wonders if telepathic royals is another secret Arendelle keeps.

They turn toward the big blond non-soldier, who has been staring daggers at Hans for the entirety of this exchange. "We need Grandpabby," it sounds like Anna says. The trio conduct a whole new conversation, audible this time but too quiet for Hans to hear. He can’t track its progress except to note that it necessitates a lot of arm waving. Eventually the queen holds her hand palm-up and with a twist of her wrist she sends an ice falcon presumably toward whoever Grandpabby is.

The soldiers bring out portable camp chairs for the royals. Hans notes with surprise that the blond man gets one too. They sit in a circle some distance away, still talking in tones too low to decipher. They don't look at their prisoner, or pretend not to. Every so often a pair of eyes flicks his way.

He thinks he's getting frostbite but he bites his tongue on his complaints. There's no telling what will happen if he asks to be released within target distance of the sisters. Most likely he’ll only undo the scant progress he’s made. All there is to do is wait it out.

*

He has never seen a troll before. He isn't sure he ever wants to again. It seems to be a pile of rocks turned animate. It's face—if that can be called a face—is lumpy, with unsettlingly bright eyes. The trio greet it with a bizarre level of enthusiasm.

"What am I looking for?" the pile of rocks asks the queen, who says, "Traps."

Apparently Hans should have spent more time learning about trolls, or at least how to deflect them, because this one digs into his _mind_.

And suddenly there in the perfectly normal sky are his memories on display, his _memories_ , all the moments he holds so close and tight and confined, his brothers elbowing him in the face and pushing him out of boats, his parents forgetting his name and the day he found Sitron, the first journey to Arendelle and the shining black idea that unfolded in his mind as he lay swaying in the ship's hammock, his shock at the first appearance of jagged ice, the ease of deceit, the certainty that no one could be a worse ruler for these people than their newly-crowned queen or absurdly naive princess and that he would do far better for them, plunging deeper and deeper into the dark sucking morass of assurances to himself that the ends justified the means—and then the stench of prison, trying to sleep on stone so cold he sometimes wondered if the queen had sent her ice all the way to his cell, the rage and hatred that churned in him like lava; and the labor, days stripped of excess and filled with focused movement, the world turning more slowly now that it was without the weight of everything the prince's life had lacked; his abhorrence at what some of the other prisoners had done shooting through him like lightning, the prodding finger he touched to his own soul, the surprise when he discovered it shredded and stained but present, the long, excruciating process of peeling back every gruesome, mangled layer and building a new one in its place, the weariness of knowing how far he had still to go, the bright joy at realizing how far he had come, the shame and regret for the actions responsible for locking him in chains that won't open for anything but his eventual execution, gratitude for this strange cleansing, recognizing himself for the first time in his life, his head lighter on his shoulders—and then the gossip, the secret, the whisper that he traced all the way to it's stinking source, hope dwindling with each unanswered letter, a golden thread in his mind, a new plan. Then the image turns suddenly unfamiliar: dark churning water, hands coated with frosted crystals, a flash of light bursting forth, or is it broken ice?

The troll says, "I see danger, but no trap."

Hans is furious, mortified. He snarls, "Those memories are _private_." The queen looks at him curiously.

"How sure are you," she says, "of what you claim to know?" Her eyes, always sharper and shrewder than her sister's, are still ice cold. He breathes in and out slowly until he is calm again. All the people who have the most right to be invasive stand before him. Whatever she thinks of what she saw, it seems to have worked in his favor. Does it matter, anyway? He'll be dead sooner than not, and the dead feel no shame.

His lips are turning numb from cold, slowing his speech. "Do you know where all the secrets in the world can be found? In prisons. They accumulate and reproduce. It's hard to know what parts are true and what has been grafted on from some other secret. You have to dig all the way to the base of the root." He speaks firmly. "I'm sure. I wouldn't be here otherwise."

She says, "Where are they?"

"In the Mist. Beyond the Mist."

The sisters look at each other and conduct another silent conversation. After a moment they exchange tiny nods. The queen withdraws the ice binding and Hans falls to the ground. Her soldiers are on him in an instant.

She tells Mattias, "We're setting off immediately. Send a squadron back for more supplies; they'll have to travel quickly. Ten men will escort the prisoner back to the Southern Isles." The general looks like he wants to protest but holds his tongue. She makes another ice eagle. "Tell Olaf," she commands, and it flies away.

"Your Majesty," says Hans. "I'm coming with you."

Everyone stops and stares at him.

He clears his throat and gestures to the pile of rocks. "We all saw—whatever that was, at the end. That's not happening in some southern prison camp. I'm supposed to come with you."

The pile of rocks says, "It was a glimpse of what may be, not what _is_ —"

"I need to," Hans says. He adds quickly, "And you need me. Nobody knows what's beyond the Mist but I'm betting that eventually you're going to need a fall guy. Right? The one you can sacrifice so one of your own men doesn't have to die. Who's a better man for the job than one you hate, who’s already on death row?"

The sisters look at each other. They look at Mattias. He says, "With your leave, ma'am, I'll defer to you."

The queen says, "If he's safe… well. I suppose it wouldn't _hurt_."

Anna says, "I guess."

They look at Hans, two skeptical and disapproving mirror images. The blond man says, "The queen of Arendelle and her sole heir, journeying to the Mist together with their sociopathic would-be murderer. Wow, this is the best idea the two of you have had as a team, ever."

The queen spins her finger and ice manacles appear on Hans' wrists. They bear a distinct resemblance to the iron cylinders he encased her hands in six years ago. He gives her a wry look, well aware the similarity is intentional. "In case you get any ideas," she tells him, and they set off.


	3. Chapter 3

The queen is across the clearing, laughing with the big blond non-soldier. The soldiers call him the iceman; the royal sisters call him Kristoff.

Hans hammers tent stakes into the ground and watches the queen. He hasn't figured out yet what exactly is the nature of hers and the iceman's relationship. She is relaxed in his presence; her smile is bright and unguarded. They're clearly close, and demonstrably affectionate in a way Hans is inclined to think is love. There's no other discernible reason for the iceman's presence here. It makes sense: he loves ice, and she is practically made of it.

Hans smiles to himself, glad she's happy.

What did you expect? sneers the back of his mind. That she would still be looking over her shoulder in fear? Still unable to open her heart to anyone? Jumping at the rasp every time a sword is drawn? It's been six years. Did you really expect to have a lasting effect?

Of course she's happy. But he's allowed to be glad she is. Isn’t he? That she’s stable and thriving instead of fearful and insecure? He isn't sure if he's allowed to look at a woman whose life he almost ended, whose sister's death he had a hand in regardless of whether she came back to life, and be proud of her: that she could overcome her own failings and his treachery and emerge on the other side stronger and better for it. He doesn't know how hard she has fought to get there, but based on the woman she was six years ago, and with his own battles of the self in mind, he's willing to bet it hasn't been easy.

*

He is excruciatingly careful.

He keeps his distance from the royals, knowing they're skittish around him (frankly, he's a bit nervous himself, never knowing if he'll accidentally do or say something that will promptly reverse the queen's temporary amnesty and see him swinging from the nearest tree). They need time to adjust to his presence, so he keeps himself visible, just at the limits of earshot if he can manage it. After a few days of this, Anna is no longer glaring every time she sees him. The expressionless mask the queen shows him barely shifts, but her eyes stop tracking his slightest movement. She's at her most tense when he's within range of Anna, so he does his best to avoid the princess and to look harmless when he can't.

He is given his own tent, to his surprise, and is locked up each night with unbreakable ice, not to his surprise. The soldiers give him a clean set of clothes and a bar of soap. He declines their offer of a shave—he likes his beard, and razors aren’t difficult to lose one's grip on, slipping easily into the throat. He'd like a haircut, but he doesn't trust them to cut his hair into something other than a hack job.

He eats his meals alone because, as Anna says, "We have to believe you, but we don't have to like you." He doesn't know if he would choose otherwise. He is accustomed to the gray choking mist of loneliness, and he hadn't had friends in prison but at least they had all been on the same level. You could talk to your neighbor without them looking down their nose at you. He listens to the laughter of the various groups gathered around their various campfires and knows that if he were with them he would still be outside of that camaraderie, looking in through an invisible wall, just like with his brothers. He's lived his whole life without it, and he doesn't need it, and he's glad to be here regardless of the circumstances. He misses Sitron so badly his lungs ache.

If he's going to make it to the Mist alive and worth anything, he needs their full trust. He makes this his next project. He's never had trouble making himself likable. It won't be easy, but if he can climb from the prison's most despised, denigrated inmate into a neutral presence with both the other prisoners and guards— _twice_ , in both the prison and the labor camp—he can certainly do the same with this group. He starts with the soldiers.

Prisoner Westergaard keeps his mouth shut and makes himself useful. Via Mattias, he manages to get his manacles transformed so that his hands are free when they make or break camp. He helps construct the tents and build the campfires. He washes the supper dishes and loads the wagons. He is particularly attentive to the horses, knowing a soldier's first love is their steed and first enemy is the man who mistreats it.

The shackles are cold around his wrists, but he’s able to ignore them as long as they touch the cloth of his sleeve instead of bare skin. At night he wears gloves under the manacles. He hardly notices the inconvenience of his bonds. Iron or ice, he has been locked up for six years. Chains hardly stand in his way anymore.

He doesn't balk at being perpetually supervised. He doesn't argue or pander or try to make conversation. He isn't polite—he discarded that habit a long time ago and trying to revive it is like putting on a coat that's too small—but he isn't rude. He ignores their derision and stands silent in the face of their many attempts to goad him into a fistfight: pathetic tardy endeavors to display their love and loyalty to their queen, who is worth five thousand of them on her own. Neutral.

Arendellians are soft stock, he concludes. His own islanders would have created an opportunity to fight, not waited for the fish to pick their bait. He remembers them from six years before, unable to so much as rustle up a leader to watch over the kingdom while their royal house stood vacant. The queen has changed for the better; her people haven’t much to show for themselves.

He has a feeling, though, that these soldiers would be crueler if not for the general. Mattias runs his camp like a ship: orderly, no-nonsense, and fair. He doesn't tolerate physical altercations or mockery or abuse of power, regardless of those involved. Hans has never met a truly irreproachable man before. The queen clearly looks up to him, which Hans finds fascinating, since it's clear the general couldn't possibly think more highly of his queen, and has molded his platoon into a company worthy of her banner.

One of them he recognizes. It's a lieutenant who was present when they brought the queen down from the mountain. This man he avoids more than Anna.

He wakes at first light and only stops when the last job is done. It's exhausting, but there are worse things than being bone-tired. This is how he proves he has healed, he reminds himself.

He's still surprised when it works.

He has just sat down by his lone campfire to eat supper when he discovers he has company. "You did good today," says the lieutenant from the mountain. "Mind if I join you?"

And with that, Hans is accepted. The lieutenant sits down and suddenly there are six men behind him.

He lets the camp barber cut his hair. It's a relief to have it out of his eyes.

*

He is tightening a bridle when the queen appears by his side. Hans is so surprised he nearly chokes the horse.

She doesn't speak, so he doesn't either. She picks up a curry comb and brushes out some of the mud on the stallion's flank while he finishes tacking up. He finds himself thinking of his mother, who had gloves made so that she never had to touch her mount, claiming the horse-stink stuck to her skin.

"Do you know?" she asks quietly. "What's beyond the Mist?" and he realizes that this is really why she let him sway her to bring him along, and this is why she didn't press him for more information while her soldiers could hear.

"Nothing I'm certain of." Nobody really knows, though plenty claim to. "I tried to find out, but I couldn't find anyone who had actually been there." The one secret the prison couldn't provide.

"The sailor who told you about my parents," she prompts.

"He said they were trying to get to the Athohallan River. It's a river beyond the Mist, supposedly. He didn't know why. Your parents only shared their plans with the captain." He squints in the sunlight to look at her, wishing he didn't have to be the one to tell her this. She's gripping the brush so tightly her knuckles are white. "They could only get as far as Skog Norr. They landed and took a squadron of soldiers into the forest. They made it to the Mist, according to the report from the soldiers who survived. Your parents went inside. When days passed and they didn't come back, soldiers went in after them, and they didn't come back either. Eventually there were just two soldiers left. They waited until their provisions were gone, then decided to go back to the ship for help. When the captain heard their story he killed the soldiers and faked the sinking. Any maps your parents had they took with them—the sailor said the soldiers looked, before they were killed."

She nods and departs without another word. He watches her cross the grass to join Kristoff. The iceman puts an arm around her shoulders; she leans into him.

Lucky bastard.

*

Subtly as wind wearing away stone, Hans expands to the group he thinks of as the quartet: the queen, the princess, the iceman, and the general.

The issue with having tricked the sisters into trusting him years ago is that any overt attempts at friendship will ring false. The soldiers weren't an easy victory, but the methods he used were straightforward: work hard, don't complain, roll with the proverbial punches. Like a soldier. He has no idea who the queen wants him to be. He has no idea what will bolster his standing or what will dig him into a deeper hole.

He keeps it simple: holding a horse's bridle while they mount. Quick smiles or nods of acknowledgement if their eyes happen to meet. _Respectful, honest, harmless._ There is no rush. They won't reach the Mist for a month, if that. The platoon is too large to move quickly.

He eats with the soldiers; the quartet eat together. The queen isn't an elitist—she'll sit down with a group around their campfire without hesitation, and she welcomes soldiers around her own fire. But she never joins a circle where Hans is sitting, and it's an unspoken rule that Hans isn't to sit with her. Another invisible wall.

*

He watches them without appearing to.

It doesn't take long to conclude that the only deep waters present are the queen. Mattias seems to be the textbook definition of 'what you see is what you get'. Kristoff is a bit of a puzzle, but hardly a man of mystery. The queen somehow manages to be warm and gracious without giving away a single thought. Anna couldn't hide a thought if her life depended on it.

His favorite to watch is the queen. She carries herself with dignity, moves with easy grace. When the platoon encounters an obstruction, she rarely makes a decision without consulting the general and a lieutenant or two, but in the end hers is always the final word, and she's yet to be wrong. Sometimes she'll slip out of her tent in the middle of the night to stargaze by herself.

He thinks she's a little shy, which makes it all the more interesting when she does choose to speak to someone who isn't one of the quartet. When he was a prince he could have charmed her into conversation. It would have been quite a game, drawing her out, making her comfortable, supplying questions she could have (gratefully) answered without effort. He would have presented himself like an old friend, never a hint of patronization, but would have appeared to slowly grow more enthralled; and it wouldn't have hurt that he would have been been polished and handsome and smiling only at her. If he played it right, she would have fallen under his spell in a matter of days, if not hours.

The sisters and the iceman play mindless word games together to pass the time while traveling. They're all fairly gifted singers. Anna and the iceman like to sing duets while they ride. Hans prefers the queen's voice, but she is reticent about displaying her natural talents; the only time she does is at night, within her tent, singing lullabies to her sister. Everyone outside goes quiet so they can hear. Hans thinks if she knew she was audible from the outside she would never sing again, and finds himself wishing she knew how much they love to listen.

The queen and the general have quiet conversations he can't ever get close enough to overhear, which means the topic is most likely political. Other times she talks with Anna—long conversations that bore him, an outsider, all about people and projects and events in Arendelle. It's the sisters' interactions that pique his interest. They weren't even on speaking terms the last time he saw them. Now they're practically attached at the hip. How did that happen?

*

He bids them cheerful good mornings. He smiles like they're already friends, makes easy remarks that could serve as conversation openers. He wades waist-deep into rivers to guide their horses over algae-slick stones. He jokes around with the soldiers when the sisters are within earshot—see how he is liked?—and scouts ahead with the trailblazers—see how his input is valued? Anything to show he's not the man he was.

They are dismissive. Cautiously confirmed as a safe element, he is easy to ignore. He has already heard Anna ask the queen if his presence here is really necessary.

He thinks of long years fighting to be visible amongst a crowd of thirteen sons. Back home, he would have formulated vast, intricate plans for attention. He would have gotten revenge for every slight. He can hardly do so here, nor does he particularly want to.

He grits his teeth. He hasn't come this far for nothing.

He has a score to settle with himself. He has a place to carve out before he departs from this world. A true hero. He's nothing to anyone. Hell if he'll die being nothing to himself.

Caring about people is exhausting. Well, pretending to care. This all would have been much easier if he had been able to follow his preferred plan, that being to rescue the king and queen by himself. Were he travelling alone he would probably already be at the Mist by now. He certainly wouldn't be sitting here playing nice.

He tries again. And again, and again, steady, tireless (no matter how tired he is, and he _is_ ) attempts at friendship, no matter how many times they shut him down. They have to trust him. They have to let him see this all the way to the end.

*

He doesn't know what to make of Anna and the iceman. They are clearly close, perhaps more so than the iceman and the queen. They dance together and ride side-by-side. Anna flings her affection to whichever of the four winds is quickest to sweep it away, so for a while Hans thinks nothing of it.

One day, though, he sees them holding hands and comes to a full stop. He hasn't seen Kristoff do that with the queen. The mental picture he has been piecing together collapses into confusion.

*

The first sign of progress happens when the soldiers eating with Mattias call Hans over to join them.

They have gotten more comfortable with him—he's learned their names, has listened patiently to stories about their families, has answered their questions about prison, has been able to make them laugh a time or two—so it's no surprise to be invited to join them. Hans sits, his eyes on the general, half expecting him to get up and join another group. He doesn't. He's a good conversationalist, actually, Mattias, and Hans finds himself warming to him. He's a straight arrow, a clear thinker with a thorough grasp of his duty and his role. Hans wonders if the queen knows she has unearthed a diamond in the rough in her choice of general. He has a feeling she does.

*

The second sign of progress is when he finds half of the quartet sitting down to join him for supper: the general and—wonders never cease—the stoic, sarcastic iceman. Hans had expected him to be the last one to come around.

Well, he thinks. Sneaking that reindeer a few extra carrots paid off in an unexpected way. It's a nice realization, since he'd only done it due to wishing Sitron was here. He's growing weary of calculating his every word and action.

"I'm Kristoff," says the iceman. "Anna's husband."

Anna's _husband_.

It isn't until Hans realizes the rush of feeling that slams into his lungs and spreads through his veins is relief that he finally admits to himself that he may be in trouble.

*

Kristoff is the tipping point. Anna comes tumbling after. Hans wishes he could have made a bet with someone on how long it would take for the princess to change her mind once Kristoff did.

Hans needs this, obviously, but he hasn't been looking forward to it. The cost of the princess's approval is suffering her extraordinary lack of self-awareness. And he has never had much patience for chatterboxes. It's amazing, really, thinking back on their brief engagement. He has literally no idea how he managed to feign affection for even those few days.

It's a relief, then, to find she has actually managed to grow up. She's still chirpy and enthusiastic, but less excitable, less needy, more rational. The iceman (whose nickname is apparently one of affection, since it turns out he’s actually a duke but hates the title) has a steadying effect on her. And she has a lightening effect on him, Hans notes, appreciating her levity for the first time.

He is able to congratulate them on their marriage with true sincerity. He listens attentively to Anna's minute-by-minute recap of the entire event. Poker-faced, he listens to Kristoff's recital of the reception toast given by his reindeer— _his reindeer,_ Hans can't believe this is real life—and even makes appreciative sounds at the poetic parts. The reindeer seems to nod approvingly whenever he does so, and Hans spends the rest of the day sure he's losing his mind.

They don't invite him to join him around their campfire. He thinks they would, if not for the final stone in the wall.

He catches himself watching them during suppers. Eyes shining in the firelight, faces warm with affection. Anna is golden and bright and obvious as sunlight. The queen is quieter, understated, the silver moon hanging in a black sky. Luminous. Singular.

He listens to them laughing together. Telling stories, making plans. Reminiscing and debating. Leaning into each other's embrace, tracing lines down each other's noses, pressing kisses to each other's temples. _Family._ This is what one looks like, then, when love is part of the equation.

*

"A talking snowman," he echoes.

"I mean, when you say it like _that,_ " says Kristoff. "But hey, the trolls are there too. Arendelle is in good hands."

" _Right._ "

*

The soldiers find out about his birthday thanks to Anna, to whom he can't recall ever telling the date.

"I remember it," she says, "because your birthday is the same date my favorite horse died when I was ten." She raises an eyebrow humorously. "I should have taken it as a sign."

He must hand it to her: once he's in her good graces she's fully in his corner. They don't have the supplies for a cake (and he doesn't want one, it's awkward enough to be wished happy birthday all day, he wants to be on good terms with the soldiers but it's like they've completely forgotten who he is, what he _did_ )—but there are a few bottles of aquavit, enough to pass around the campfire circles a few times.

The platoon sits in the quiet of an autumn night. Hans listens to the snapping fire and distant crickets and low hum of conversation. It was a long day and they are glad to close it out with full bellies and fine liquor. A good day, he reflects, appreciating the fatigue that is the result of hard physical labor. It burns more pleasantly outside of prison.

A bottle comes to Kristoff and Mattias, who lift it to him before taking their swallows. One of the soldiers sees and, to Hans' intense discomfort, stands up to make a toast.

"We have before us a man who is _capable._ Who makes _sacrifices._ Who is _visionary._ " As everyone's jaws drop, he starts talking about Hans' leadership during the freeze six years before. It's that same blasted lieutenant from the mountain. Hans should have known better. A quick glance confirms the queen and the princess are nowhere in sight.

"No one knew what we were facing but the prince was ready for anything. He was the first one to engage the snow beast. The queen would have killed us. It was Hans who saved us. You should have seen her up there, throwing ice everywhere. She was completely out of control. She was a madwoman. A _monst—_ "

Hans has him backed against a rock wall with a hand around his throat before anyone can react. "Take it back or I'll throw you headfirst off the first cliff I find, you gutless disgrace to your rank," he hisses. He can be ice, too.

The others are shouting _woah, you don't want to do this, stop_ and tugging at his waist, forcibly loosening his fingers, pulling his arms away, dragging him across the clearing to the treeline. Hans throws them off, breathing hard. He tries to shake the adrenaline out of his shoulders. Frustrated, running a hand through his hair, he turns and almost slams into Elsa.

She looks like a marble statue in the moonlight, cool and motionless. Her eyes are resting on him. Her expression isn't quite blank but he can't decipher whatever she's thinking. He’s losing his touch, he thinks irrelevantly.

Her eyes slide to the man he attacked, who is screaming for Hans' blood whilst being forcibly restrained from charging at him with a sword. The others haven't noticed her.

"He's not wrong," she points out.

His fighting blood is still up, which will be the excuse he'll offer for the words that escape him, though he doesn't try very hard to keep them contained. "I never took you for a fool." He remembers: "Your Majesty."

She blinks.

She is a beautiful woman, the queen. No one would argue with such a statement, and Hans' blood runs just as red as anyone's. This close to her, though, he's almost distracted. He forces himself to look at her hair, so fair it looks white in the moonlight.

"The only monster on that mountain was me." She has to stop forgetting this.

Something sparks in her eyes. "Give me some credit," she says. "I did make that ice beast."

He's surprised into laughing. It leaves his throat like he's being strangled.

There's the briefest touch of a smile on her lips. He wants it back as soon as it's gone. She says, "You don't have to care. That's not part of this deal."

He says, "Listen, I know you can stand up for yourself. But I'm part of the reason he thinks what he does. And if I let that slide, they might start reconsidering. They might start to think his story is the truth."

"If you murder him, I'll have to execute you." She nods to the soldiers behind him. "I don't think they'd like like that, do you?"

"You think they'd care?"

"Friends usually do."

Friends.

He gestures to the crowd shouting in the firelight behind them. "What do you want to do about this, then?"

"I want to keep up morale. I have no idea what we're facing. No one does. I need everyone working together. We can't start splintering."

"You think I can help with that?" He pauses. "You'll let me?"

She considers him for a long series of heartbeats before lifting an eyebrow a la Anna and deadpanning, "What else could I expect from a man who is capable? Sacrificial? Visionary?"

"Your Majesty," he starts.

"Prove it." Her eyes are practically colorless. He can hear a thousand meanings in those two words. Prove everything you've claimed. Prove everything you are. This is where the salt meets the ice.

He nods, once, slowly.

She turns away. She looks like a moonbeam with her silvered hair and her dark coat, the only hard proof of her presence the rustle of the fallen leaves as she passes over them. She opens the flap of her tent and vanishes inside.

He walks back toward the soldiers, elated.

She's _letting_ him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hans is clearly a scorpio


	4. Chapter 4

The next two days are misty and damp, which serves to keep everyone in low spirits. They trudge through the forest, making slow progress and getting on each other's nerves. Hans spends most of his waking hours covered in cold mud while trying to loosen wagons from the grip of one mire after another.

The following day is clear. The company perks up and doubles their speed. They dry their clothes to a crisp next to crackling campfires and start singing again while they stake their tents and cook their suppers. The universe's most complex creatures, humans, Hans thinks to himself, and yet so incredibly simple.

*

The queen slips out of her tent like starlight on a shadow. Hans watches her walk toward a hillside that overlooks the valley. After a moment she's out of sight.

He stays where he is, stretched out on his back with his hands pillowed under his head, watching the sky. The night is cloudless and the stars are dense and bright, shining in their multitude as though he could drag his hand through the air and they would cluster like diamonds on his fingertips. He traces out the invisible lines of old familiar constellations. The fire throws sparks into the air, golden embers that drift down slowly like falling leaves set aflame.

After a while the fire isn't climbing as high and he starts to shiver. He rolls to his feet and grabs a spare blanket.

As he approaches the top of the hillside he realizes it's the aurora she's looking at, not the stars. The rippling colors aren't as sky-filling tonight as they have been in nights past, and from the campsite they're barely visible, but she has found a spot where the whole show is on display before her. He looks for a guard or the night watch. She's alone.

"Your Majesty," he says softly. She goes rigid at the sound of his voice. The eyes she turns on him could freeze lava. He realizes her fingers are outspread, ready for a fight.

He curses inwardly. What was he thinking, approaching her from behind? He's expecting too much, moving too quickly—of course she doesn't trust him yet—hand over the blanket and leave, fast.

"It's cold out," he says, thrusting the blanket toward her.

Her mouth opens slightly. Her eyes slide to the blanket. She doesn't take it from him. "How did you know I was here?"

"I was awake. I saw you."

She looks past him. "Where is Anna?"

"The princess is sleeping, as far as I know."

She nods. Her shoulders relax slightly. She still doesn't reach for the blanket and he belatedly realizes he's an idiot, she doesn't need blankets, she's practically a winter element herself.

"Pardon me, Your Majesty. I wasn't thinking." He dips his head to her and turns to go.

"Wait," she sighs. He stops.

She holds out her hand for the blanket. He watches her spread it on the grass and sit, then look at him and indicate the empty space to her left. It's a clear command to join her. He settles himself at her side, careful to keep a good amount of space between them.

"I'm still getting used to this," she says.

"Me too."

"I will say: it helps that you look different."

He runs a hand over his beard. Messy, trashy things, beards—his mother never permitted any of her sons to wear one. He loves it. He lost the last dregs of his princely polish the instant he grew it.

He says, "I'll never be able to attend a masquerade ball again. It's a dead giveaway."

"It's not just the beard," she says. "It's everything about you."

He takes a gamble and flexes a bicep. "So you noticed these."

She gives him a quelling look. "That's not what I'm talking about." Her tone could give a man frostbite and for a moment he's a little scared of her until he realizes—

" _Oh_ , so you _did_ notice."

"That's not—"

"I am much more attractive now, I know," he says with showy modesty.

She almost laughs. "Stop. I _meant_ … There's something about you. It's like more of you is visible now."

He speaks seriously. "Everything you see is the truth. Everything I've said has been true. I'll swear it on anything."

"Yes," she says. "What keeps me up at night is wondering what you're not saying."

"You think about me at night?" He lifts an eyebrow at her.

" _Stop_. You know what I mean."

He does. "I'm not withholding information. I don't know that I could if I tried. It's a relief, frankly—being honest. It's incredibly uncomfortable, too, I don't like being exposed. My first instinct is to put the mask back on. But."

"It's freeing," she says softly. "To not have to hide yourself."

"Exactly."

She lets out a slow breath. "You realize I have to wonder if even this is part of the act."

"I guess that's to be expected."

"Why are you really here, Hans?"

So he tells her. How hard he has fought to become who he is today. About a lifetime of being nothing; about dying as someone worth being. And of course there's the opportunity to help someone he has hurt.

She looks thoughtful. "So what you're saying is, this isn't entirely altruistic on your part."

"Not entirely."

"That's actually more convincing than anything you've said so far."

"Okay, wow. So flattering. Thank you."

She laughs and looks up at him. After a moment she bites her lip and averts her eyes. Hans realizes he's staring.

Time for a change of subject. He nods to the aurora. "What are you looking for up there?"

"Nothing," she says simply, and he—

is eight years old again, twelve years old, sixteen years old and alone, loveless and angry and lost, staring up at the firmament over the Isles, at these vast impervious skies that are just as indifferent to him as everyone else he knows, that make him feel just as small, but provide odd solace in the knowledge that their disregard isn't specific to him; that want nothing of him but have never found him lacking, that do not love him but have never hurt him, that seem to whisper to him if he listens closely, that seem to hold him if he leans into the wind.

How on earth has he managed to find someone who understands that sort of loneliness?

"When I was in prison I could only see a little bit of the sky through the window. Every night, it'd be the same sliver of stars sliding past as the earth turned. Only changing with the season. Now, I know my stars, you have to be able to chart when your life revolves around boats, but—some patterns get into you, make a mark. Tattoo themselves on your life."

"Which ones?"

He shows her, swinging his arm in an arc from horizon to horizon. So simple, just stars, strung up there night after night for everybody to ignore, but for him: a lifeline. A home, even. Maybe. He doesn't really know what one is supposed to feel like. He got a taste in Arendelle, the irony of which has never been lost on him. This strip of stars is the closest he's come since.

They sit in silence and watch the shifting colors. The aurora is green with hints of red and yellow. After a while the queen yawns and they stand and fold the blanket together. They walk back into the slumbering camp without anyone noticing. Hans makes a mental note to take the night watchmen to task in the morning.

He sees the queen to her tent, nods goodnight, starts to depart. She touches his arm to stop him.

She swallows. "I used to hope you would die. In prison." She takes a long breath in. "Our purpose here aside, I'm glad you didn't."

He runs his tongue over his teeth, considering his answer. "I used to think your kingdom would be better off with you dead and me ruling in your stead, and then I tried to make it happen." He holds her gaze. "I'm glad I failed."

Her eyes are dark and shining and endless. If he doesn't walk away he's going to do something truly insane, like tell her so.

He realizes he's staring again and rips his eyes away. "Goodnight, Your Majesty."

She slips into the tent. He marches back to his bedroll beside the fire that has dwindled into glowing coals. He throws a few logs on the pile and looks at his bare hands. She has forgotten to finish locking him up.

He wavers.

Mattias blinks blearily at him from behind the opened tent flap. Hans holds his hands up for the iron cylinders.

*

He stokes the meager yellow fire. The royal tent flap opens and the queen steps out, squinting in the pale morning light. She is wearing a dress of deep goldenrod that somehow thaws the ice blue of her eyes.

"Good morning, Your Majesty," he says, and for the first time she gives him a genuine smile.

*

He lets his expression turn warm when their eyes meet. She nods to him when they pass each other. For a while she only replies with 'quite well, thank you' when he inquires after her, but she includes a smile, and he takes it as a good sign that she's answering at all. She's shy, he reminds himself: they'll work up to full sentences. And they do.

She doesn't seek him out, so he doesn't either, but he stands in as her horse's groom whenever he can manage it. He asks her opinion on the saddle's tightness, on the blanket's cleanliness, on the bridle's durability, soon they're going to run out of tack to discuss but for now it's enough to be conversing with her at all. Sometimes they chat about the soldiers, though there's little she doesn't already know from Mattias.

The first time he joins the group around her campfire he doesn't have a chance to say a word to her beyond a respectful greeting. He is seated across the circle from where she sits with Anna. Kristoff and the general talk to him the whole time, asking a million questions about sailing races in the archipelago. The queen's attention is absorbed by her sister, but she looks at him when he stands up at the meal's end, and the smile she sends him warms him more than the fire.

*

They wake to frost. Everyone dons cloaks and coats. Their breaths puff out of their bodies and transform into tiny white clouds that hang in the air. Anna hands Hans a blue woolen scarf with grave instructions to do his part in flatteringly representing the world's redheads.

The woods are carpeted in gold and orange. As the sun rises higher it burns off the chill, but the day is still cold enough to keep everyone's cheeks and noses pink. They spend most of the day on an upward slope, trekking through the woods topping the bluffs that border a river. Hans and the queen, who leads her horse by its lead line, walk alongside each other in silence.

He wants to talk with her but he can't think of a single thing to say. His mind is as blank as though he has forgotten every word he knows. This is the most he can do: walk beside her with clear intent, keeping pace with her, pausing when she does. She stops when he stops, too, bringing mutual intent to their synchronicity that sets a bundle of electricity sparking in his stomach.

"What will you do when they're back?" he finally asks. "Will you relinquish the throne?" He'd rather talk about her, her opinions and passions and whatever is going through her head at this exact moment, but her parents are the safest topic at hand.

"I don't know," she says. "I don't know what they'll want."

"What do you want?"

"Peace."

"There might be laws mandating what should happen, but I doubt there's a precedent."

She lifts a green-cloaked shoulder and drops it. "If they want the throne I won't fight them for it."

"Others might fight them for you."

"What? Who? Why?"

"You're a rather different sort of ruler than your father was, Majesty. Some—many—say, a better one." He spins a red oak leaf between his thumb and forefinger. "You're much more in tune with your people. They love you. _Very_ much. I doubt they would be happy to see you step down."

"How do you know this?"

"You might say I took a certain personal interest in any news pertaining to Arendelle that trickled through the prison yard. Your soldiers, they're wondering too—what will happen, what will be required of them, if they'll have to pick a side."

"They will remain loyal to the throne of Arendelle, no matter who sits on it."

"Please, Your Majesty, I didn't mean to upset you. Of course they will. They're just worried."

She takes a deep breath in and releases it slowly. "Let's find out if my parents really are alive first. Then we can worry about a civil war."

Conversation thoroughly dead, they resume walking in silence. Hans wonders if he should maneuver them to join Anna and Kristoff; this was obviously a bad idea. He keeps his eyes fixed on a point in the distance. The good mood that had filled him like oxygen is gone; his jaw is so tightly clenched it hurts. What was he thinking, choosing that particular conversation topic?

He can feel the queen's eyes on him.

"If I do lose my throne," she says, "you'll have to call me Elsa, instead of Your Majesty."

He appreciates—and is surprised by—what she's trying to do, and while he doesn't relax, he tries to soften his tone to match hers. "I'll call you Your Highness. You'll be a princess again."

"I'd rather you call me Elsa."

His eyes swerve to find hers.

"Regardless," she clarifies.

He studies her. She means it.

Well.

She'll probably rethink it later and rescind her offer, but right now she's making obvious overtures of friendship and he isn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth. He allows a corner of his mouth to crook up. She smiles up at him, white and cool and clear as a mountain breeze.

"Elsa," he accepts, and has to catch his breath. This isn't the first time he has said her name, to her face or others or himself—but. It's the first time it has been a thing that they're sharing.

"Hans," she says, and smiles a little.

The sound of her voice saying his name hums through his whole body. He realizes after a few steps that he's trying to think of ways to make her say it again, and has to rein himself in like Sitron after one sugar cube too many.

Very - very - _very_ deep trouble.

*

They make camp by a wide brook. The days are getting shorter; it's nearly dark by suppertime. There's rustling in the undergrowth from animals still preparing for hibernation, but the woods are quiet in the twilight: the birds and insects are gone.

She finds him when he's splitting a fallen tree into logs small enough to burn. He stops when he sees her blue-clad form approaching.

She smiles—close-mouthed, brief, but warm and genuine and all for him. He feels his whole heart light up. He answers her with a broad smile of his own. Stop, _stop_ , he tells himself, you don't deserve this, you don't get to have this; but he can't help it.

"We're going to play a game. Losing team has to make pancakes for the whole camp."

He lodges the axe head in the tree stump he's using as a base and props an arm on the handle. "Who is we?"

"You, me, Anna, Kristoff, Mattias if we can talk him into it."

He's part of the quartet. He tries not to read into it. They just need a non-soldier player.

The game is charades. They aren't able to talk Mattias into participating, which means it's Hans and Elsa against Anna and Kristoff. Good odds, Hans decides. He's an excellent actor.

Anna screams, "Circus zebras! Edelweiss! Elsa's royal portrait! Ginger tea with honey! Chameleon!"

Elsa says, "Oh—I think—is it?—maybe—sleeping?—um—candle?—Are you sure it isn't sleeping?"

Kristoff shouts _time_.

"You," Hans says, "are terrible at this."

"Why do you think they stuck you with me?" the queen replies, complacent.

"You should have warned me," he tells Mattias.

"Why do you think I don't play this game?" the general replies, complacent.

"Twenty-four to three," Kristoff says smugly. "Game point."

Pancakes have only ever been a breakfast food to Hans, but evidently it's something of a tradition in Arendelle to make post-supper pancakes during long platoon journeys. Anna and Kristoff sit on a nearby log to watch the proceedings and harangue the losers, which irritates Hans until he realizes Elsa is laughing. She accepts defeat with more good grace than he thought was humanly possible.

She smiles when he makes this observation aloud. "I've had years of practice. Those two are unbelievably competitive." He wonders what his brothers would make of her.

To make enough batter to feed everyone requires about a million ingredients and enough skillets to garner a side-eye. He expected the mess cook to be at their elbows, bossing them around, but the man is nowhere to be seen; instead it's Elsa giving instruction every step of the way. She shows him how to heat the skillets in the coals of the cookfire, then leads him to the supply wagon and starts handing him spice jars and bowls and one hefty bag of flour. "You've done this before," he observes.

"Anna and I cook together as a bonding thing. We both have a bit of a sweet tooth, so we usually end up making sweetbreads and such."

"Is that what you would do if you weren't royal? Run a bakery?"

She chuckles. "I'm hardly more than a novice. We don't have time to do it all that often. Pancakes are the only thing I know how to make by heart, and that's because of the tradition." She considers. "I used to think—I wanted to be a librarian, back before my coronation. I hid in the library a lot, so I guess it was a natural predilection. Now… I don't know, I get to do so much for so many people in this role. It's hard to imagine a life that would be as satisfying without that level of access."

"Oh, spoken like a true public servant. No wonder they love you."

"What did you want to be? When you were little, before you knew what being a prince meant?" Spoken like a true diplomat, artfully avoiding any mention of his present or future circumstances. Or recent ones, when he got it into his head that being a king would suit him fine.

"A doctor."

Her head turns his way in interest.

"My brothers used to get all cut up in weapons practice and fall off horses and beat each other up, and I used to watch the palace doctor stitch them back together and slap ointments on their bruises, and like a miracle they'd be healed. I wanted to know all about how the medicines and poultices worked and how the body worked. He even let me follow him around, like a miniature assistant, and I'd—you know, do the simple stuff, unwrap bandages, hand him scissors. Until my parents got wind of it. I'm still not sure if I loved the doctoring part or if I just wanted to be him. He was the kindest man I've ever known."

She smiles up at him, gentle and understanding, and he wants to bury his hands in her hair and—

Anna shouts, "How's it coming along over there, losers?"

They snap back to attention and finish gathering supplies. Then they go back to the cookfire and start mixing things.

From that point forward it's total mayhem.

They start pouring out ingredients, some of which land in the barrel they're using as a mixing bowl but mostly get everywhere else—all over his hands, all over the ground, in Elsa's hair, in his _boots_. Anna and Hans perk up and start shouting at them—encouragement, instructions, criticism, Hans can hardly distinguish a full sentence with Elsa's voice in his ear, telling him one cup of this and two scoops of that, so of course he starts shouting back at the hecklers to shut up, which naturally encourages them.

"Looks like there's a bit of a void in that barrel where the flour should be, Hans!"

"You want my job? Be my guest!"

The soldiers, attracted by the shouting and laughter, come over to see what's causing the ruckus and start placing orders, and of course they're all experts too, eager to tell the cooks how long to mix the batter, the best method of pouring it into the skillets, where to position each pan over the fire. Hans quickly discovers that pancakes have an irritating tendency to burn on one side while the other remains deceptively raw; the hecklers eagerly provide descriptions of the bubbling and golden tint and springiness that indicate a thorough bake, none of which match up with anyone else's except that the final product must be perfect. Hans shouts and laughs over his shoulder at them—

"Only a man who can show me a bottle of whiskey has the right to tell me what 'golden brown' entails, Anton Hasse!"

"Well it's certainly not that! What are you doing, you took it off too early!"

"Don't question my methods! The master is at work here!"

"Yes, and she's doing a far better job than you!"

"Send him to the end of the line, Anna!" he roars.

There are at least four skillets on the fire at any given time, though the average is six; for a few horrible, ambitious minutes there are eight. The fire intermittently dies down and then roars back to life, the jar of cinnamon is never where he left it, and there is most certainly batter in the butter jug. A fine mist of flour and cinnamon and powdered sugar seems to hang in the air. Elsa's hair is turned golden in the firelight.

He gets the hang of it pretty fast. There's something remarkably satisfying about flipping a perfectly golden-brown, crispy-edged pancake out of the pan, especially if he can manage to land it on the plates Anna holds up like a target. Elsa is more decorous: she uses a spatula to scoop hers out onto a plate, then hands it to a soldier with a smile that turns most of them pink.

He and Elsa dance around the fire and each other and pass the batter barrel and mixing spoons and the egg crate back and forth over the flames. Elsa frosts the handles of all the skillets and draws designs in all of her pancakes with ice so that they'll melt into patterns, which is cheating, because his taste just as good as hers if not better. While the skillets are full they rapidly peel and slice apples and bananas to add to their constantly shrinking cache. Hans chronically checks all his skillets for signs of scorching. 

This close to the fire, the ice shackles still don't show the slightest inclination to melt. He's deeply impressed.

Some of the soldiers have started singing pub songs; he would bet ten pancakes the pop-up choir was instigated by the princess. Anna and Kristoff hold court on their log, yelling jokes and stories and doling out powdered sugar and honey to any takers; Anna bangs two ladles together every time a pancake is ready, as a summons to anyone still waiting their turn, not to mention an effective way to contribute to the noise of the crowd.

"What do you want, Valloy?" Hans hollers, brandishing a spatula and a carton of blueberries. "Tell me now or you're getting a plain one!"

"I don't want anything from your ugly mug unless you can do it up with a picture of a swan!"

Elsa laughs up at him. "No pressure, Hans." She flicks her finger and a frosted impression of a galloping horse lands on the pancake she just poured into one of her skillets.

Eventually the swell of the crowd eases back and he realizes there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

"Is that everyone?"

"Oh my goodness, it's everyone. We did it."

"Except ours." He holds up the barrel. "Just enough left."

They sit side by side beside the fire, watching the final two pancakes slowly puff up. "I like making things," she tells him, apropos of nothing. "Tangible things. Food. But especially things that require design. Buildings, sculptures. That's what I would do."

"You might have the opportunity soon," he points out. "Your parents' return could bump you off the throne for a while." He raises an eyebrow at her. "So maybe it wouldn't be the worst thing, hm?"

"Perhaps," she says neutrally. Diplomats must find her a treat.

He pushes his hair away from his face with his forearm. His shackles might not be melting, but he feels like he is. He feels energized, too—good humor is singing through his blood, settling like warm honey in his stomach. It has been such a long time since he has had anything like this. His hair falls back into his eyes and this time he doesn't bother with it.

He lifts his head to find her watching him. She flushes and looks away.

His heart pounds. "Elsa?" he says, soft.

Anna's singsong voice reaches them. "Ellllsaaa… it's buuuurniiing…"

Elsa casts a frost on the underside of the skillet to cool it. A moment later she's whirling away to find two plates. He flips the pancakes, eyes on her back.

Mattias, Anna, and Kristoff took their own portions last; they join Elsa and Hans around the campfire. The soldiers are still wound up, but the circle has splintered into smaller groups around other fires. Laughter and shouting and singing fills the clearing from all sides. Forget getting any sleep tonight. They're going to be awake for hours.

Kristoff makes an appreciative sound. "This is unexpectedly really good. You guys made these with camp ingredients? I'm inspired!"

"Oh, sure," says Mattias.

"I'm not going to do anything but I'm inspired."

Hans says, "That's what we do, we inspire… inaction."

Anna muses around a mouthful, "You two make a pretty good team."

"Don't sound so surprised! Just because I've never baked a thing in my life before tonight—"

Anna says, "You still haven't. Pancakes aren't baked."

"It's right there in the word, _cake_."

"It's a misnomer. Pancakes are like… cakes for cheaters. Fake cake."

"It's a bread-like substance—"

"Doesn't count."

Kristoff says, "You used a frying pan, not an oven. No dice."

"Better luck next time," says Mattias.

He turns indignant eyes on Elsa, who grins at him in commiseration. She concedes, "It was... similar. Heat was involved. Flour."

This sets off the other three, who argue _Oh please, Flour is in practically every food, Everything that's cooked with heat is similar? Tell that to curry chicken—_

"It's cake," he insists, goading them. "We made fifty cakes tonight. When's the last time any of you made fifty cakes in one go?"

_Oh, give me a break—_

He bites back a grin and meets her eyes.

She doesn't look away.

*

He'd have been more surprised if he hadn't fallen in love, frankly. She is beautiful and fierce and intelligent and _lovely_.

The queen he had tried to kill had been a scared girl barely out of adolescence. She had been uncontrolled chaos, a ruler who had put the lives of every person in her kingdom at risk, who had alienated the sister who loved her so badly that it had created a void that was laughably easy to shape to himself. The woman he meets in the woods is confident and warm and witty, and it's sour and sweet together, the knowledge that if he'd known someone like her six years ago he'd have never done to her what he'd tried to do.

He wonders how she overcame it. The chaos. Herself.

"Love," she divulges, but with a smile that tells him it was so much more than that.

It gets stronger every day, barely needing more than the mere thought of her to feed it. He can feel it expanding in his chest; soon it's going to burst out of him, breaking his ribs and leaving his chest gaping and exposed.

Idiot, he thinks. You tried to kill this woman.

But. He tries out the thought, tentatively - but. What if he just... loves her? She doesn't have to love him back. Is that so terrible? To have attempted to murder her once, and love her now? Are they mutually exclusive?

He doesn't think he has much choice in the matter.

*

The scouts come back with reports. There's a river ahead, cutting along the edge of the known woodland. Across the bank looms a new forest: Skog Norr. The gateway to the Mist.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> added yet another chapter to the total count because i live to keep all of us guessing
> 
> 'fire and salt' is an idiom i like to imagine was born while arendelle was ineffectively trying to beat back elsa's winter, which hans would naturally carry forward with him through the rest of his life because it's such a useful phrase, like me and 'y'all' which y'all can pry from my cold dead hands even though i haven't lived in georgia in over a decade

They can see the Mist for two days before they reach it. It's a gray wall, thickest on the ground and stretching skyward, effectively blocking anything within and beyond it from sight. When they finally stand before it, there isn't a soul in the platoon who doesn't sense its malevolence.

Soldiers go in with rope tied around their waists. The instant they step inside, they become inaudible; when dragged out, they report that they couldn't hear themselves screaming. They could barely make out the shape of their hand in front of their nose. They thought they were going to suffocate.

They go in with goggles and breathing tubes. They discover their compasses don't work. They walk all the way to the end of the ropes and never reach a break in the cloud.

One brave man volunteers to go in with all the rope lines tied together. After two hours, he stumbles back out. "There's no end," he reports, shaking so hard he can barely stand.

*

They split into squadrons. One heads west along the mist wall, one east; the third stays at the spot where they've made a makeshift base. The royal sisters are told in no uncertain terms by the general to stay put.

The western group comes back with reports. They found the spot where the late king and queen's retinue made camp.

*

Anna sifts through the decaying debris, searching unsuccessfully for remnants of her parents. Kristoff and his reindeer nose through it with her. Hans finds Elsa standing in front of the mist wall.

"Look," she says. She touches her palm to the wall. A golden wisp glows briefly inside.

"What is it?"

"Memory. Nothing has disturbed this place in years. The water molecules are the same ones my parents walked through. The last ones that moved, I can… _feel_ them. It's like—I'm starting to gather them to me, but not turning them into ice. They energize and then fade. Does that make sense?"

He doesn't care how she's doing it. The pit that has just opened up in his stomach has the bulk of his attention.

"You want to go in."

"I think I have to."

She holds up her hand and freezes the space directly in front of her, just her height and width. The mist freezes into a flimsy snow column. She makes a twisting motion with her fingers and it vanishes.

She steps into the hollowed space and touches the mist in front of her. Again, the golden glow—but two sparks this time, one directly ahead of her and one veering to her left. With that, she rejoins Hans, to his intense relief. After a moment the mist begins to seep back in to fill the cleared area. Within seconds it's as if the wall was never touched.

She says, "Who else can track them like I can?"

"Elsa, this is—" A terrible idea, unbelievably dangerous, she's not supposed to be risking her life, _he_ is. "Please think this through. You might be following a false trail. It wasn't just your parents who went in. What about the soldiers who got lost?"

"My parents knew where they were going. There are multiple paths, but only one direct one. I just have to think like an arrow." She smiles reassuringly at him. He feels sick.

"What are you _doing?_ " exclaims Anna. Elsa whirls to face her sister, who bears a distinct resemblance to a thundercloud. "Did you just go _inside_ that?"

"Anna, look—"

"Elsa. _Elsa!_ You can't go in there!"

Hans steps aside for the princess. The sisters argue over each other, with Anna's voice the louder of the two.

"I can't lose you too, I don't care if it's the only option—"

The raised voices attract Mattias, who comes over to investigate. Hans steps aside for the general.

He finds himself next to Kristoff, who is watching with folded arms. Kristoff's ever-present reindeer looks on as though it's actually tracking the course of conversation.

The iceman nods to him. "Who do you think's gonna win?"

"Honestly? It's a toss up."

"Nope," says Kristoff. "Elsa's gonna win. See how her chin is doing that thing? That's how you know."

Mattias is gesturing to the busily-working soldiers of the platoon. "This is an elite task force. I'll lead—"

The queen says, "You won't make it two steps into that mist without me."

"Your Majesty, I am not risking your life—"

Anna says, "Right! Exactly!"

Sparks are starting to enter Elsa's eyes. "I don't recall it being your life to risk."

Anna says, "Kristoff!" She turns pleading eyes on them. "Hans!"

Hans only raises an eyebrow. He can see how this is going to end, and he doesn't like it, but there's not a chance he's following anyone into that Mist but the queen.

Kristoff takes the deep, unenthused breath of a man who knows his role but hasn't been looking forward to playing it. "In that case, it's not your life to risk, either, _Queen_ Elsa. It's Arendelle's. You have a duty to your people and that involves staying alive to rule them."

"Anna is my heir and surrogate queen in my absence."

The surrogate queen in question says, " _What?_ You're keeping me _here?_ You are _not_ keeping me here!"

"We can't both go—"

"Elsa, we've been through this a hundred times. I'm not leaving you!"

"This is different, Anna."

"You can't go in there alone!"

"I won't be alone." Elsa looks at Hans. Three other sets of eyes (four if he counts the reindeer, and he _doesn't_ ) turn his way.

"Him?" Anna squawks. "Wait. Just him? Just the two of you? Elsa, you can't really intend—"

"My queen, _please._ Take a squadron with you. Let me go with you, at the very least. Your Majesty, I swore to protect you with my life—"

"Hans!" Anna says beseechingly. As though he's going to try to talk Elsa out of anything she's set on doing. If nobody else is invited to this party, well, that's that, then.

The queen's gaze on him is steady. Confident. Trusting.

She says, "Well?"

*

His bedroll, two spare pairs of socks, his scarf. A firestarter. Gauze and medical thread. An axe. Rope—one length should do, hopefully that decision won't come back to haunt him. Mattias gave orders for dried rations, those should be arriving any minute now. Water, they don't need to bring water if she can freeze the Mist. Is the Mist drinkable? Does he want to drink it? Water, he'll need to get water.

Kristoff sits in Hans' tent, watching him pack. He says, "So. How are you going to tell her?"

"Tell what to who?"

"Tell Elsa," says Kristoff patiently, "that you're in love with her."

"What makes you think I'm in love with Elsa?"

"Er," says Kristoff. "You do know you are, right?"

Hans sits back on his haunches and gives the other man an impatient look. "There is an extremely high likelihood I'm going to die soon."

"My thoughts exactly. Hence the telling her."

"Knock knock," says Anna's voice at the tent flap. She slips inside before Hans can stop her. He shoots a look at Kristoff. _Not a word._ The iceman rolls his eyes.

Anna settles herself on the blanket beside her husband. She is calm now; she and Elsa had a long talk after the argument at the mist wall, and—after a good deal of resistance—the princess was brought around to her sister's way of thinking. "I came to see if you need help with your speech."

"What speech?"

"The one you're going to give to Elsa," she says. "To tell her you love her."

He growls, "Does everyone know?"

"Yes," they say in unison.

Anna says, "I mean… have you been trying to hide it?"

Kristoff says, "At all?"

"In that case, I don't need to bother. She already knows."

Anna gives him a look. "Hans."

"What do you expect me to say? 'I'm probably going to be eaten by the Mist and if I survive I'm slated for execution sooner than later because a few years ago I tried to _kill you_ , so I thought you should know I'm in love with you'?" He punches a coat into his pack.

"Rough," says Kristoff.

"Needs work," says Anna.

Hans barks, "Out! Out of the tent. Both of you."

They protest. They're just trying to help. They figured he would want advice from the only married couple present. They're sorry if they're overstepping.

"Do you want me dead? An ice skewer through my heart? Is that it?"

They look confused. "No."

"Have you lost your minds, then? What makes you think she would want to hear this from me?" He wraps the rope into a tighter loop. "Do you think she does? Fire and salt, what am I saying? How is this supposed to work out? I'm on death row!"

"And I'm a princess. We're not without resources, Hans."

"That's not how it works, Anna. You're a foreign dignitary, not the Southern Isles' High Court!"

"Anna?" Elsa is calling from somewhere outside the tent. At the sound of her voice, Hans fumbles the rope; it unwinds in huge figure eights on the ground. Anna and Kristoff cover their mouths with their hands in an attempt to stifle their snort-laughs. He glares at them.

"Okay, okay. We're leaving." They crawl out, smiling hugely.

"Ridiculous," he huffs. And they called _him_ insane.

*

The platoon and the quartet gather for goodbyes beside the wall of mist as Hans and Elsa prepare to go in.

The iceman claps a heavy hand on Hans' shoulder. "Good luck, brother."

"Take care of yourself, Kristoff." _Brother._ "And this fire eater." Hans winks at Anna, who wrinkles her nose at him and pulls him into a hug.

"Take care of my sister," she says, voice muffled by his coat. She steps back and her voice becomes bell-clear again. "I'm counting on you. If I can't be there to watch her back, you're the next best option, seeing as—you know."

He says softly, "You're okay with this? After everything."

Anna gives him a small, warm smile. She slips her hand inside his coat to lay her hand over his heart. "I believe this. Who you were is in the past. Who you are today—that's who I'm pulling for. Anyway, grudges are boring."

"Simple as that."

She grins. "Hardly."

He smiles back. "Good luck, surrogate queen. I swear it won't become a permanent title if I have a say in the matter."

"Thanks. Me, queen. Can you imagine?" Anna shudders.

Privately, Hans can think of very few worse options. The apocalypse occurring, perhaps. "Maybe with some practice," he says unconvincingly. She snorts.

Mattias leaves Elsa, who is accepting well wishes and farewells from some of the soldiers, and shakes Hans' hand with smile. "Get over there, fall guy."

"Thank you for everything, General."

Mattias gives him a proud nod. "You're a good man, Hans. You really are. If it couldn't be me going with her I'm glad it's you. Be careful in there, son. For both your sakes."

He's going to be useless in there if they keep this up. Throat too tight to speak, he shakes Mattias' hand and goes to stand by the mist wall so he can clear his head.

He reviews the plan. They have enough food to last a week if they're careful. If they get lost or stuck, Elsa will shoot ice fireworks out of the Mist as a signal to the platoon to send in reinforcements. If for some reason she's unable to send the signal, Hans has flares, though it's impossible to know whether they'll be visible from outside the Mist. If they make it to the other side—assuming there is a beyond—there is no way to know what to anticipate, so they're anticipating everything they can. Mattias gave him a short sword when no one was looking. Kristoff gave him an ice pick. Anna tried to give him a crossbow, realized it wouldn't fit in his pack, and gave him a bundle of dynamite instead. The lieutenants, all acting independently, slipped him knives of various size and serration. His back is going to be aching by the time they're done with this trip but he's unwilling to discard a single weapon while they don't know what they're facing. Not that he needs them as long as Elsa is on her feet. If she goes down, well, he's pretty sure he'll already be down by that point, but one never knows. Anything that might serve to keep her safe is worth keeping.

The sisters have already said their goodbyes privately. They share one last embrace, arms wrapped tight around each other.

Then the queen is standing beside him, blue-coated and pack shouldered, saying, "Let me see your hands."

Hans holds them up, shackles clinking. With a wave of her arm the chains vanish.

His fingers instinctively move to rub his wrists. He wonders how honest people do this all the time—carry around all the trust and good faith that their loved ones and fellow men bestow on them. Is it always this heavy? Nobody knows better than he how pure his intentions are where Elsa is concerned and even he doesn't trust himself as much as all these people seem to. And now she has unleashed him. What if it doesn't stick? What if some animalistic side of him rears up from beneath all the layers of rock and dirt and honesty and love and turns on her?

She's looking up at him with her midnight eyes like this is the last time she'll ever see him. "Hans."

"Listen, if something really bad comes along, let me take it on. I know you'll want to throw yourself in harm's way for the sake of my beautiful beard but if you get hurt I'm guaranteed to die by Anna's hand and whatever she does to me is bound to be way more painful than whatever's waiting in there, so let's just skip all of that, okay?"

" _Hans_." Still serious, but with a hint of a smile. "Thank you. Whatever happens, I need you to know... I'm glad I'm facing it with you."

"Nowhere I'd rather be, Your Majesty."

Worry flashes through her eyes like lightning. He wonders if this is how she lives her life: constantly beating the fear down. "And be _careful._ "

"Hey." He lifts her chin with his fingertip. "Hey hey hey. It's going to be fine. You're like ten times scarier than anything I've ever heard of. There's no way we're not coming out on top."

She presses her lips together and nods. He turns toward the mist wall and squares his shoulders.

"Let's wreck this thing."

She faces the Mist and holds out both hands. The space in front of them turns into a block of snow. Another twist of her hands and the snow vanishes.

They step inside. The mist closes in behind them.


	6. Chapter 6

The Mist is cold. Hans wasn't expecting that. He says so to Elsa, who hadn't even noticed.

Moving through it is tiring. They have to be constantly in motion: looking for the golden wisps that indicate her parents' trail, making sure they're on the correct path and not a criss-cross from the lost soldiers, shoveling away the blocks of snow and stepping into the cleared space before the mist slinks back in to where they're currently standing. Elsa could vanish the snow but it's an additional drain on her energy, and Hans is concerned she's going to exhaust herself before they reach the other side, so he cuts it down with the ice axe.

Eventually they find a rhythm: she does the freezing, he does the snow removal, she does the tracking, he makes sure they're in position before they're swallowed by encroaching mist; but it's physically and mentally demanding in ways neither of them were prepared for. The fact that they don't know what they're walking toward doesn't help.

It's not the worst thing, though. He has her all to himself.

And then he loses her.

He clears a snow column out of the way and waits for her to step forward. She doesn't.

"Elsa?" He turns around.

Thick mist fills the space where she was just standing, where she's meant to be.

He screams her name and gropes through the fog. His arms don't collide with anything. She doesn't answer his shouts. He listens hard but doesn't hear the whisper of a cry.

He stands frozen in place, unwilling to move lest they lose each other forever in this wall-less maze. Mist seeps in around him. He's just about to take a deep breath and plunge in anyway when suddenly all the moisture surrounding him solidifies. Just for a moment it's ice-cold on his skin, then—it whirls and vanishes.

She's standing in the center of a twenty-foot wide cleared space, five steps away from him.

"Hans!" She surges forward and he clutches her to him. "I'm sorry," she gasps. "I thought I saw a glow out of the corner of my eye and I turned around and you were gone."

After that they keep the rope firmly tied around both their waists. What were they thinking, not using it before? Even so, he's constantly reaching out for her, brushing his fingertips over any part of her that's close, bumping against her arm with his. Her fingers will briefly grip his sleeve; he'll clear the snow and find her a breath away from him.

It takes them a while to find the trail again. They freeze and clear and take a step, freeze and clear and take another, careful snail-like progress through the endless fog and white and cold. Whistling makes the place seem even quieter, so he hums to himself instead and sometimes manages to pick a tune that Elsa is willing to sing with him.

After a while he notes that she looks pale. Well—paler than usual. "Getting tired?"

"No. You?"

It occurs to him that she won't stop for her own sake, but she will for his. "We should rest."

"Just for a minute."

She makes an igloo around them: a rounded structure of nearly transparent ice, large enough for him to stand in, lacking both a window and a door. It shines with some sort of inner light.

He asks, "What makes your ice glow?"

"I don't know. It always has." A surprising answer. He would have expected her to have done endless, exhaustive research on anything related to her powers.

It feels wonderful to sit down. He stretches his arms and neck. She leans her forehead on her knees and sighs.

"Hey," he says softly. She looks up. "I'm sure they made it through."

She nods: anxious, but permitting herself to be reassured.

"We haven't lost the trail yet," he reminds her.

"Yet."

"We have our methods. Surely they had theirs. Anyway, if they're anything like you and Anna, they didn't know how to quit."

"I hope so. I never really saw them up against anything like this. You know, something difficult, requiring perseverance. Fighting for something. Or against something. They were peaceful. Kind. Affectionate." She says suddenly, "Sometimes I wonder if I ever knew them at all. I've thought about them—during this trip, obviously, but before this, too. They hid so much from us. They could have done so many things differently. They _should_ have."

He doesn't know what to say to that. His parents are a poor example of any standard worth following, but they're consistent. Hard and unmoving as steel. They have no use for secrets, any more than they have use for sheltering their crowd of sons from any unpleasant truths. They won't shed a tear when he is executed; he doesn't need to witness it to know.

The little he knows of the late king and queen of Arendelle is hardly remarkable. They impress him as by-the-book rulers and bland personalities. They kept their heads down when it came to international affairs. Arendelle was hardly on the map until its newly-minted queen unleashed deep winter on her unsuspecting subjects.

He wishes he could comfort her. This is an old, deep wound, one that can only be healed by the source.

"Sometimes," he says slowly, "that's all you can do. Acknowledge it. Move forward. They should have done things better. They didn't, but you can."

Neither of them miss the double application. He hopes that that's reassuring: she already has fought such a battle and won it. He's a firsthand witness.

"What would you do with your life now?" she asks, meeting his eyes, deliberate: "If things were different."

He hasn't even allowed himself to dream of something like that. He stares at the shining ice, wondering how on earth he's supposed to answer. If things were different? There are a million things he would do if things were different.

"I'm sorry." She is distressed. "That was insensitive of me."

"It's okay."

"No it's not. I had no right to turn this on you."

"It's okay." He gives her a half smile. "I would learn. As much as I can about everything. Even the other night reminded me how ignorant I am—I can barely cook a simple meal. I never did learn how the body works. Frankly, I'm still figuring out how to care about anyone but myself. Everything I had as a prince was given to me; I had very few expectations to meet. I learned etiquette, I learned how to fight, got pretty good at deception. In prison I learned how to do without. But I know nothing valuable about the world. Nothing about the good parts. I would do everything, Elsa. Find the good parts. See if I fit into them somewhere." He doesn't say the obvious: _But that's not in the cards._

Soft, she's making him soft. He's been softening for weeks, losing the mental armor and the singleminded focus that have fueled him for years. He wears reticence like leathery, tough skin—and now here he is, voluntarily exposing his heart, speaking the wishes he has buried so deep that hearing them is almost a surprise to himself. Soft, standing at a clifftop eager to jump.

 _Armor. Focus._ He can't be distracted. If he loses his footing he'll carry her down with him.

Distance is safe. He makes an effort: scrambles back from the edge as though it will make any difference now, after he's softened so much he's already permitted himself to care, with his hungry empty heart creaking open and grabbing her before his brain can see what it is doing. No. That isn't why he is here.

"Air's getting warm. We'd better keep moving." He stands and shoulders his pack.

They don't talk much after that. She would if he would, but he keeps his thoughts to himself. Before, they weren't talking all that much either, but they were communicating— _this way, shift yourself, wait one moment_ —and now they barely speak except to say—

"Is it just me or is the Mist getting darker?"

"I hope that isn't an ill omen."

She makes a motion with her hand. A large snowflake spins into existence and floats above their heads. It's no lamp, but its glow lights their way like moonlight.

They keep moving.

*

Elsa lifts her hand. Casts another snow block. Hans clears it, then nearly falls over into a dark open space.

He stumbles, disoriented and alarmed and unable to see anything beyond the snowflake's short cast of light. The ground shifts under his feet. The first unexpected lungful of clear, cold oxygen makes him think they're in a cave until he lifts his eyes to a sky full of stars.

He laughs in surprise. "Elsa, it's dark because it's night."

She steps out to join him. A relieved smile breaks through the worry lines on her face. "I was afraid we were walking into the belly of the beast, so to speak."

"Some sort of coastline, I think."

The shifting ground is comprised of seaside pebbles. He can hear the dull crash of distant waves. Water. He hasn't seen the ocean since he escaped the labor camp.

The moon is bright enough to see by. They stalk across the shoal, trying to get their bearings. They seem to be in the flatland between two rocky outcrops. The unseen ocean is somewhere in the darkness ahead of them. Nothing stirs.

They don't untie the rope. Despite the apparent lack of danger, the tangible link is reassuring. Whatever surprises await, they won't lose each other again.

They find a driftwood log and rest against it, sitting close to each other for warmth. Not that Elsa needs warming. She doesn't so much as shiver, while a fire sounds like heaven to Hans. She doesn't let off much body heat either, so as a source of warmth she's fairly ineffective, but he isn't about to tell her so, not when her arm and her thigh are pressed to his side like they were custom made to fit there.

And if she doesn't need warming, and she's sitting this close to him voluntarily—He tries not to think about what that might mean. Not while he's the fall guy.

 _Distance_.

But. _This_.

"The moon is low," she says. "It's not that late. Let's rest for a while and keep moving." Some of the color is back in her voice. Their triumph over the Mist must have given her her second wind.

He hands her the food satchel and takes a slug of water from the canteen. He passes the canteen to her and she drinks half of it in one go, so now they have approximately one day to find her parents before they run out of water.

"What?" She stops mid-guzzle, noticing the amused slant of his mouth.

"Just wondering where you're putting it. You're barely bigger than the canteen."

She sounds a little defensive. "I get dehydrated easily."

"I'd assume one would, if one spent a day making an avalanche's worth of snow. I bet the waterline in the fjord went down by a foot after you made that ice palace."

She gives him a side eye that means he's not too far off the mark.

"Do you ever go back up there?"

"No. The associations are… unpleasant."

"Pity. It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen, and that was through a haze of fear and adrenaline."

She scoffs and tries not to smile. "You haven't seen anything yet."

He looks at her moon-silver hair and her pearlescent skin, thinks about the constant potential for terror and wonder brimming under these deceptively lovely outer layers, thinks about the generosity and kindness woven all the way through her. Protectiveness surges through him like fire. He has to fuss over the repacking of the food satchel until it subsides enough that he's sure he won't say something foolish.

They eat and rest and regain their strength. When they're ready to resume, he holds out his hand to her and pulls her to her feet.

She looks up at him. She doesn't let go of his hand.

Her eyes are dark and shining and endless.

If he's going to die tonight there are a lot of things he doesn't want to have left unsaid. This isn't the time, though. They need to be sharp, they need to be ready for anything, they can't afford weak spots. They don't have time for this. She doesn't deserve a rushed, babbled baring of his heart. Assuming she wants to hear it. He's wasted a whole day—days, weeks—in which he could have said something. And now they're here and he has to focus. He has to be ready for a fight.

She says, "Listen, if we don't make it—"

She's going to make it. He can bet his life on that.

"I want you to know—I know these have been odd circumstances, but—I'm glad you came back. The last few weeks have been—for _me_ , at least—"

His heart soars.

"Didn't expect—who could have, really—I know _I_ was shocked—but it really makes sense if you think about it—" She's endearingly flustered; her cheeks are flushed and she talks with her hands. "I know I should have said something earlier but—"

He laces a hand through her hair, leans forward, and kisses her.

She breathes, " _Oh._ "

Then she kisses him back. For a moment he forgets to breathe.

Her mouth is soft and perfect. Their kiss is gentle, slow, much slower than he has been imagining, but there is a sweetness in holding her like they have all the time in the world, in her mouth moving against his as though this is the first of a lifetime of kisses and there is no need for urgency. He wants to savor it, he wants to savor her, this woman who has somehow become everything to him, who somehow wants him too. There's warmth to her after all: the soft, slick interior of her mouth, her breath on his lips between kisses, her cheek under his thumb.

Their mouths linger and separate and reunite, over and over until there's nothing left of the world but whatever space or lack thereof is between them. They draw each kiss out, some feather-light and barely brushing each other's lips, some searching and welcoming, each one in achingly perfect harmony, tender in a way he had no idea existed. There is a sense of a gulf crossed, a bond cemented; it feels exactly right, this thing that is too vast and delicate to touch with words.

It ends because it has to. They stand with foreheads touching, eyes closed, reluctant to return to the world. He drops his hands to her waist, then wraps his arms around her, feeling her muscles and ribs, feeling her breathe. Hers slide around his back to hug him tightly. When is the last time anyone held him? She rests her head against his chest. How can he be expected to let go of her now, after this?

She murmurs, "I can feel your heartbeat."

He breathes in deeply. "We have to keep moving."

"Hans—when this is over—"

He opens his eyes and leans back to place a gentle finger on her lips, then removes it and kisses her lightly.

"We have to keep moving," he says, more firmly.

There is no trail to follow anymore. Her parents were looking for a river, so they move toward the shoreline. Perhaps the waterways connect. They don't let go of each other's hands even though it slows them down. Her fingers are small but strong; their chill wraps around his. The soft pad of her thumb strokes the base of his from time to time in an absentminded caress that holds more of his attention than the task at hand.

The ground slopes steeply downward and turns more rocky. The briny seabreeze strengthens and whips at their hair and clothes. The pebbles under their feet turn to sand. Despite everything, Hans' heart lifts at every gust of wind, at the hint of salt on his tongue. He feels stronger with every breath in.

They circle a sharp rock column and are met with a blast of wind and a dark, wide horizon. Huge black waves crash and dissolve into ribbons of white foam.

"That's not a river," Elsa says.

"Look. There's something on the far shore."

They can just make out a land mass on the horizon: low, craggy mountains loom at the edge of the sea. The peaks are cut through by a wide flat strip of white. It looks like—

Elsa seizes his arm. "A river. A frozen river."

They study the violent sea separating them from their destination. Dark waves as high as palace turrets curl and crash with crushing force. Sometimes they withdraw to reveal rock formations in the breakers. Clouds have rolled in to cover the moon, limiting sightlines.

He says, "We're going to need a battleship."

She says: "All you need is me."

*

First Elsa adds ice spikes to the bottom of his boots; then she removes her shoes altogether. They discard their cloaks and packs. She tucks her hair up out of the way. Hans wants to untie the rope, but she refuses, saying, "I won't be able to check that you're keeping up, and I won't be able to hear you if you shout. This is the only way I'll know you're in trouble."

She stands at the shoreline and assesses the waves. Her chin is up, her shoulders back. There isn't a flicker of hesitation in her face.

After a minute she nods to herself. She plants her feet and stretches out her arms. Hans braces himself.

Thick ice shoots across the breakers to form a ramp, a road: the first piece of a bridge that she'll build as they cross the sea, that the waves will rip apart behind them.

He's so proud of her he almost forgets to run.

*

At the mouth of the frozen river stands a palace.

There is no sign of life. There are no sentries, no lamps burning. It would hardly be eerie to find an abandoned building in an uninhabitable place like this, except that the entire thing, from cornerstone to intricate scrollwork, is built of ice.

It glows with the same light Elsa's does.

They walk through it slowly, warily, and as silently as possible. His arsenal was abandoned with their packs but Hans has daggers in his boots and the short sword he strapped to his back. He holds the sword at ready; his ears are pricked for any noise that isn't their footsteps. His fingers begin to turn numb around the hilt. Their breaths puff out in clouds.

The palace is staggeringly beautiful. Massive ballrooms open to grand halls. Stairwells spiral endlessly upward. Ice tables with lace-like cutouts stand beside deceptively soft-looking divans. Elaborate ice chandeliers hang from the ceilings. Snowdrifts cover the floor.

They enter an art gallery. Two rows of breathtakingly lifelike ice sculptures line the room: a rearing horse. A hummingbird in flight. A set of crying children—identical triplets. Swans, a bevy of five, in the act of taking flight. A woman holding a parasol, shielding her eyes. A man running, every muscle strained. A pack of snarling wolves.

Hans hears a cry of horror from Elsa and whirls.

She is looking at another ice-cast couple: a man with a protective arm around a woman, whose own hands are outstretched as though attempting to block an attack. Lines of panic and fear etch their faces. Even so, he can see the family resemblance.

Elsa reaches out to touch her parents—

A rich female voice says, "I wouldn't do that if I were you."


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> elsa: oh look the important river is frozen  
> me: AW YEAH EVIDENCE OF A SNOW QUEEN. SHOW ME THE WHITE WITCH IN AN ICE CITADEL. F I N A L L Y  
> jennifer lee: it's a memory bank :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for those of you who might prefer a russian translation, it’s [here](https://ficbook.net/readfic/8936558)! thank your translator ♡
> 
>  _so_ much appreciation to christophe beck, who composed [this beautiful piece of music](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65oZzbr8GJk) which managed to align with critical moments both in f2 and here. i listened to this probably 1000 times while writing the end of this chapter.

Elsa jerks her arm back. The eyes she turns toward Hans are wide with alarm.

The voice says, "Hold on tight, darlings." Snow begins to swirl around Elsa's feet. It churns like water, throwing her off balance. Hans lunges for her and misses. "Elsa!" he cries, an instant before he finds himself soaring skyward. The gathering snow pulses en masse and transports them out of the room in a miniature, controlled avalanche.

They are deposited in a heap within an enormous circular throne room. Ice columns hold up a rounded ceiling from which hang glinting crystal chandeliers all larger than a wagon. A figure reclines on an elevated dais in the center of the floor.

Hans' first concern is Elsa; he helps her to her feet, simultaneously giving her a quick once-over for any injuries. Her attention is locked on the dais. "You're like me," she breathes.

"Oh, no, darling. _You're_ like _me_."

Hans turns toward the dais and the woman there. He curves protectively toward Elsa, every sense on high alert.

The snow witch is so beautiful it's hard to look away. The mind is mesmerized, trying to absorb such a rare sight, wondering how it's possible for such a perfect arrangement of features to exist. Her skin is unnaturally chalk white, her mouth ice-blue; her hair is black as the deepest heavens and snowflakes sit on her eyelashes. She is wrapped in an enormous coat of white fur, though Hans, having seen some of Elsa's creations, wonders if this is another illusion. She wears ice at her throat and hands and ears like diamonds. Her legs stretch languorously on her enormous seat of ice; her pointed chin is propped in her palm. She surveys them with curious, intelligent eyes.

"Elsa, is it? Why does that sound familiar?" She tilts her head thoughtfully and flicks a finger. The frozen former king and queen of Arendelle whisk into the room. "Ah. Yes. That Elsa. And who is your interesting friend?"

Hans says, "No one of importance."

"Oh?" Her smile is breathtakingly lovely: white and wide, ending in sharp upturned points. "So you won't be missed."

He doesn't see Elsa's reaction, but she does, and she smiles even more broadly. He follows her gaze down to Elsa's right hand, which is clenched in a fist.

"Or perhaps you will?" The snow witch leans back in her chair, smiling down at them. "Well, I do believe that brings me up to speed."

Elsa's voice is level, neutral. "Not us, however. My parents—how did they become this way?"

Ever a diplomat. Hans thinks it's pretty obvious what happened. Whether they idiotically challenged the wrong opponent or merely wandered where they weren't wanted, all roads end in ice. He and Elsa need to get out of here.

The snow queen's thoughts evidently run on the same track. "How do you suppose, sweet Elsa?" She spins a finger and sets a flurry of snowflakes loose around them.

"But why?"

"They are serving their sentence."

Elsa goes rigid. "Then. Then they aren't dead?"

The witch shrugs. "Six of one, half a dozen, darling."

"Please, _please_ tell me how to free them."

"Touch them and they will unfreeze. You will, of course, freeze in their place."

That's less than ideal. Elsa worries her lower lip. "My parents were good people. What could they possibly have done to deserve such a fate?" She is evidently going to try to argue their case, though even Anna could tell her it's not going to work.

The queen's eyes flash. Her harsh voice fills the room: "You think they didn't?" She studies Elsa; after a moment she relaxes and smiles again. "Poor Elsa. You really don't know." She could be a purring cat, Hans thinks; sooner or later she's going to tire of toying with them and pounce.

"I suppose I might as well tell you. But first: let's confirm you really are who you purport to be." She makes a motion with her hand and the air around Elsa and Hans fills with hundreds of deadly-sharp ice arrows, all suspended in space and pointing right at them.

He doesn't even have time to react before the arrows are flashing through the air. No time to fling himself to the ground. No time to shove her out of harm's way or shield her with his body.

And then they stop, and shatter, decimated by the thick ice of the protective globe Elsa throws up around them.

She gasps for breath, shaking from the waves of adrenaline that are still kicking in, and buries her face in his coat to reassure herself he's alright. He holds her tightly and glares at the snow witch.

The woman on the dais is laughing with genuine delight. "Very good! _Very_ well done, darling! I almost had no hope for it at all, except that you said you were like me." She waves a hand and vanishes Elsa's ice globe. Hans feels Elsa tense. She lets go of him and straightens, now visibly on her guard. There is no telling what will be flung at them next.

"Tell me, poor sweet Elsa, do you like your gift?"

Elsa watches her, silent and wary.

"It is a gift, you know. I gave it to you."

Hans hears a sharp intake of breath.

"You love it—I can see that you do. Only someone who loves it can use it as you just did, instinctively, needing hardly more than a subconscious thought to activate it. That's how love works."

"It's more complicated than that."

"Yes. Yes, it is. The ice, it lives in us. It's as much a part of us as our blood. This is what your parents would have ripped from you." Her voice turns brittle. "This is what they sought and then reviled. They came to me before you were born, seeking a gift worthy of a princess. Your mother was a northerner so she had a claim on a boon. And I gave it to them—gave it to you. _My ice_."

Elsa is as rigid as a statue. Hans puts a gentle hand on her back, right between her shoulderblades. She lets out a shaky breath. He feels her inhale under his palm. _Steady_ , he thinks at her. He half-listens to the witch. The bulk of his attention is on making sure the sharp staccato of Elsa's breathing keeps filling the air.

"And this was their payment?" she says hoarsely, gesturing toward her frozen parents.

The snow witch sounds pitying. "Oh, darling Elsa. One doesn't pay for a gift. No. Your parents' punishment, as with so many who have committed a crime, is the result of their own actions. They did it to themselves. They asked for a gift, and after I gave it to them without a single string attached, they came back wanting to return it. They demanded the means to withdraw it. They called me a _monster_. I don't," she says, "tolerate rudeness."

Hans is appalled. He finds himself in strange sympathy with the snow witch. He finds himself despising Elsa's parents. Kind, the queen called them, peaceful. Hardly. They were compelled by greed. Ingratitude. Fear of their own daughter, of what they did to her.

"I told them that if they could count all the snowflakes in my palace in three days, I would take back my gift. If they couldn't, they would become… well, as you see them now."

Elsa is trembling. "I take it you gave them no choice."

"Just as they gave me no choice when they came to redeem their boon, nor when they returned to fill my home with their lies and insults."

"No one could accomplish such a task. It's impossible. Unfair. No one could possibly know the correct number."

"Do you think I don't?" the witch replies. "As for fair. Which of their actions in this little saga do you consider _fair_?"

Elsa says, "I agree that they were wrong to demand what they did, but you had no right to take their _lives_. That's not justice!"

"Yes, yes, and you insist I restore them to their former state. Even with my ice, you can't help but be your parents' daughter, can you?"

"I only want you to give back what you unlawfully took."

"'Give'?" The snow witch blinks languidly, belying her sharp eyes. "I have already given you your boon, Elsa darling. Our next exchange will involve payment."

Hans is rapidly becoming afraid that Elsa is going to collapse where she stands. He loops his arm around her waist and calls to the snow witch, "Thank you for the information. If you'll excuse us a moment, we're going to hold a short private conference."

He receives a heartshattering smile in return. She gestures toward the far wall. "Take all the time you need."

*

"We need to leave."

She looks astonished. "Leave? No. Hans, no, I can't. We're their only hope."

"Salt and _fire_ , Elsa. Those people _did_ this to you. And then they blamed _you_ for what it did to you. And you're still going to try to save them? I don't care if they're your parents, they deserve to rot where they stand."

"Four weeks ago I might have agreed with you," she says quietly, and suddenly he hears himself. She looks down at his fingers clasping her wrist. "Love isn't something you earn. It's something you're given."

"You ought to at least attempt to deserve it," he argues, though he's losing this argument even with himself.

"I don't have to forgive them," she agrees. "But I need to hear what they have to say for themselves first. I'll talk to them, and then I'll decide if they get to have a place in my life. But I have to talk to _them_. I'm not deciding based on her word alone. If they deserve judgment, they'll get it. But I refuse to abandon them to the whim of that—that—that narcissist."

He's unconvinced, and tells her so.

She wrings her hands, then clutches his. "Hans. Don't you see? They're—almost— _alive_. It's a _chance_. Maybe this is exactly what it looks like. But if it's not—if it's better—" She takes a ragged breath. "I want my parents back. For myself and for Anna. I can't walk away when there's a _chance_."

This is not going to end well. It cannot possibly end well. Hans groans and runs a hand over his face. "What do you suggest we do, then?"

Her face lights up. She throws her arms around his neck. " _Thank_ you."

He presses his mouth to her hair and lets his arms slide around the comfort and peace and solidity of her, just for a moment, then releases her and says, "How?"

She's all business in a heartbeat. "That's the question. How do we free them? And then how do we get out of here without getting pulverized?"

"Wait. Can't you unfreeze them yourself?"

Elsa shakes her head. "Her powers are far stronger than mine. If I even nudge in that direction I hit a wall. I tried while she was talking."

"What about her? Can you take her down?"

"What do you think?"

He suddenly realizes what she isn't saying. "It's me," he says slowly. "Fall guy, right? I'll touch them both at the same time. It'll free them both, I'll take their place, and you can all walk out of here safely."

Elsa is saying "Absolutely not, absolutely _not_ " before he's halfway through. Her voice is fierce and frightened. "I reject your offer. Reject completely. There's another way. We just have to think of it."

That's just it. He has thought of this. He has spent years thinking of hardly anything but this. It's what he has been waiting for. He came here to save her parents, and if they aren't the sort of people that he'd have preferred to give his life for, it doesn't change the fact that he'll be giving them back to her. Just as he always intended. If it takes his life to do it, it's hardly less than what he anticipated. Somehow he has always known it would end here.

She is saying, "We can talk her out of it. Make her see reason."

"Elsa."

"Offer her an alliance, grant a her a boon—"

He shakes his head. "I'm on death row, Elsa. What do I have to go back to? The only difference between me dying here or there is that here I can save your parents."

"No. _No_."

"You know just as well as I do there's no other way."

She pleads, "No. _Please_. We'll find another way. Please help me find another way."

"You have to let me do this. Let me do this! I tried to take away your life, let me give you the one you should have had!"

"I don't want it! Not if it means sacrificing you!" She takes a watery breath. Resolve spreads across her face. "It has to be me. They're my parents."

He snarls, "Over my dead body."

"It's my ice and my parents. You have nothing to do with any of this. You _can't_ die, you can't. Not now that—please, Hans, listen to me. You mean too much to me to let you do this."

"Fine, you want to make this about me? Practically speaking, your ice death is my death sentence. What do you think the platoon is going to do when the man who has already tried to kill you and has spent the past few weeks cozying up to you, maneuvering himself into a position of trust to the point that you would take him as your sole companion into the Mist, walks back out of it with your parents in tow and no sign of you?"

She looks devastated. "Is that really why—"

" _No._ And—yes, but Elsa, my motives—it's complicated—I wanted to be here, _for you_ , doing whatever it took to get your parents back, which I am prepared to do if you'll just let go of my hands!"

Her look is a kiss in itself.

She says, "The others know you have nothing to gain from killing me. You already have a death sentence."

"No, I already have a death sentence so I have nothing to lose. I have revenge to gain: finally killing the person who ruined my life."

"Everyone heard the elder troll. He saw your motives were honest."

"That isn't going to hold up in a court of law, Elsa! He's not omniscient. All he said was he saw no traps." He takes a deep breath and holds her hands tightly. Getting her out of here safely has taken precedence over his abundant dreams and plans. The fact is that there is another option. It isn't the hero's choice, but the truth will out, won't it? Nothing like an eleventh hour confirmation that a man was never the hero he wished to be. "This is how I see it. I free them. Or… we leave."

"Leave."

"Your parents are lost. We know what happened to them. We can't change it and survive. It's awful, and it's heartbreaking, but our choices are limited, and if you won't let me take their place, there's nothing left for us to do here."

"You're manipulating me."

"Yes, I am. I also happen to be right."

The snow witch calls sweetly, "Pardon the interruption at such a tense moment, but—" and Hans is shocked to find she can hear them all the way across the expanse of the throne room. He thinks of Elsa feeling her way through slumbering water droplets. He wonders if the witch is able to sense every freezing air molecule his breath stirs up.

She crooks a finger and drags them closer, their feet skidding across the fractal patterns in the floor. "Before this little conversation of yours goes any further—" She looks at Elsa. "I don't want _you_. This is payment, not a body swap. It works this way: I tell you what I'll accept in exchange for your restored parents and you provide it."

Elsa, not without trepidation, asks: "What do you want?

"Him."

" _Him?_ "

"He's very handsome, isn't he? And tall. All that _color_." The snow witch looks appreciatively at his beard.

Elsa's voice turns to flint. "You don't get to have him." Her shoulders straighten. Her chin lifts. "Thank you for your time. We won't be returning." She steps backward. Her eyes turn toward her parents. She takes one long look, then takes Hans' hand and turns toward the doorway.

The witch says, "Where do you think you're going? There is a fine to be paid."

Elsa calls over her shoulder, "There is no deal."

Hans loses control of his legs again—this is becoming tiresome—and finds himself swiveled toward the dais once more. The snow witch is sitting up, leaning toward them. There isn't a trace of a smile on her face. "I'm not talking about the deal. You _trespassed_."

"Trespassed," Elsa echoes. "There were no warnings, no locks—"

"What do you think the Mist is?" The witch stands. Her robe cascades down the dais stairs and expands around her, making her appear twice the size of an average person. "So he shall serve as your payment and you, little Elsa, are free to leave."

"Absolutely not."

"Oh, I know it will hurt a bit. But it's only fair."

Elsa’s jaw clenches. "I am tired of your definition of justice."

The witch only smiles and makes a slight movement with her hand. Ice coats Hans' boots, locking him to the floor.

Elsa blasts the growth of ice away and turns toward the other woman with red light rising in her eyes. "No. You don't get to hurt the people I love _ever_ again." She throws her shoulders back and casts a burst of ice at the snow witch: all her wrath unleashed in one lightning bright, seemingly endless surge.

When she finally drops her hands, chest heaving, the dais is an enormous globe of smooth shining ice. Nothing moves. Hans' heart lifts hopefully—

—And plummets as the ice starts to crack, then explodes. The snow witch is none the worse for wear, though in a visibly worse temper.

Hans draws his sword and charges at her, hoping to take her by surprise. He finds himself hurtling backwards and lands hard on his hip. Elsa takes over, throwing cannonballs of ice at the woman in the center of the room, who looks down at them in irritation.

Hans scrambles to his feet with his throwing knife in hand.

"Ah, ah," the witch warns him. "None of that." She freezes the knife blade and shatters it, then destroys all of his remaining weapons, simultaneously confirming that his suspicion that she is attuned to everything in the palace—she can feel everything like sight, every ice crystal, even the shape of things in the freezing air.

Then she puts him in an ice cage for good measure.

Elsa wrenches a massive ice column out of position and sends it crashing down on to the dais. In the confusion she looses him from the ice cage and cloaks them in snowflakes. "Go," she hisses in his ear, shoving him away. He obeys, not because he wants to leave her side but because he knows she can't focus with him there. She is the only one who can save them; he'll make himself a small a hindrance as possible. He doesn't go far, of course—just to the periphery of the room. He covers his head as chunks of ice plummet from the ceiling.

Elsa clenches her hands and rips up the floor, drawing up jagged peaks with razor sharp edges. She tries to surprise her adversary, trap her, send shards of ice into her heart. She creates ice beasts and hurls blast after blast of ice at the witch. An army of thousands couldn’t withstand her.

Nothing works. The witch destroys every bit of ice that comes near her, no matter how fast or threatening. It is clear to Hans that she is just toying with Elsa. He paces as he watches, his heart racing, his hands empty.

Without warning the queen surges into the air. She hangs in place for a moment, then drops like a stone. Hans shouts in alarm, nearly running to her fallen form. He checks himself when her head lifts.

Elsa picks herself up slowly. The witch even waits until she is standing before resuming her onslaught.

They are not going to win this.

Elsa runs and dodges and tries to give back as good as she gives, but she is tiring, and everyone present knows it. The snow witch is simply stronger. At this rate, the queen will be too exhausted to last for more than five more minutes, at which point the witch will go in for the kill. Hans looks on—powerless to help, terrified for her—and realizes he is about to watch her die.

And he knows.

It spreads out from his heart into his muscles and arteries, knowledge cutting a V through him, a long line of unspoken dreams streaming after. He wants his hands in her hair and hers gripping his shoulders, he wants his head on her knee in the firelight. He wants halls full of laughter and songs and running feet. He wants her mouth: curving upward in one of her slow, sleepy smiles, her lips pressed fiercely to his, her teeth caging her tongue as she says his name, he wants it now and tomorrow and forever. He wants the brawls and the bliss, the uncertainty, the steadiness. He lingers in the warmth of it, like afternoon sunlight and honey straight from the hive, mulled wine and a spring evening lit by candles, so, so warm, lung-seizing warmth, throat aching warmth, and loss so sharp his heart hurts.

And beneath it all, solid as a cornerstone: certainty. The decision, once he makes it, is the easiest one he has ever made.

He couldn't have predicted the rush of relief, but here it is. When it mattered, he didn't cut and run. He really has left that man behind. He really does love her.

His heart beats so fast he can hardly breathe, but his steps are steady and his movements sure. He crosses to where the ice statues of her parents stand. Behind him, a chandelier falls to the floor with a shattering crash. The queen and the witch fling ice at each other, their attention far from him.

He looks down at the frozen figures and breathes hard, in-out, in-out. Reaches out—stops, fingers hovering. His eyes lift to find Elsa.

Her arms are blurs, blasting ice and light across the room; snow swirls in the air around her. Ice surges up to trap her and slabs fall from the ceiling, nearly crushing her. She is focused and flushed. She shines with determination. She'll never stop fighting, not until she has no breath left, and it makes his heart nearly rupture, seeing her love in action. Seeing how hard she'll fight for him.

Every good thing he is, he is giving to her.

He fills his eyes with Elsa's whirling luminous fearless form, a smile curving his mouth as he watches her, as he lets his hands drop a fraction of an inch, both making contact at exactly the same time.

Elsa pivots, throws her head back. She raises her arms.

His fingers are burning cold. His blood cools first, slowing in his veins.

Ice shoots out of Elsa's hands, aiming for the ceiling above the witch's head.

Ice crystals spread from his fingertips to his elbows, up his arms to his chest. They race across his whole body. His feet turn heavy as stone.

An ice slab drops with an impact that makes the floor shake. It narrowly misses the snow witch where she stands amid the rubble of the dais. The witch narrows her eyes and stretches out her hands.

Hans' legs stiffen. His arms are locked in place. He couldn't move now if he wanted to. He can't turn his neck. He breathes in and doesn't breathe out. In his peripheral vision, color starts to leech back into her parents' forms.

He hears the snow witch's wordless shriek of fury. He knows the moment her attention turns from Elsa, because the barrage stops. "What have you done?" the witch screams. For one strange second he can hear the crystals forming inside his ears.

He watches Elsa run: lithe as a deer, her color high, hair flying into her eyes. He watches her scan the room for him and he sees the moment she finds him. She comes to a stumbling halt. Her face turns ashen.

His heart beats.

And then it doesn't.


	8. Chapter 8

Hans expected darkness, the sort that accompanies enchanted sleep, so it is perplexing and then alarming to stay conscious. Ice doesn't sleep or die. It is time trapped, locked in place. He is going to spend eternity awake in a frozen coma.

Self-concern shatters at the sight of Elsa, whose own moment of paralysis has passed. She gasps for air as though drowning.

"No— _No!_ "

And he mentally screams it with her as she runs toward him, stumbling over icy rubble, arms reaching for him, her intent obvious. He would give anything for the ice witch to build a thick wall of ice around him but she must be content to look on. He watches Elsa hurtle across the room toward him and then, too quickly, she is in front of him and her eyes are close enough for him to see the variations in the blue of her irises and there isn't enough time to memorize them before she is touching him, _touching him_ , and he resists it as hard as he can, tries to hold the ice inside of him, even as he waits for it to leak out of his powerless body into hers.

Nothing happens.

Her hands landed on the first places she could make contact: his chest and shoulder. Her brows furrow in confusion. She moves them to his neck and cheek: skin, his true body. Still nothing.

Fear enters her face.

She tightens her hold and concentrates. He can tell she is trying to wrench the ice out of him, but she can't dislodge it. He is so relieved he could shout. The curse is stronger than her.

She grips his shoulders and levers herself upward to press her mouth against his frozen one.

No, _no_. She can't do this, she can't _do_ this. A true love's kiss. He has never been so afraid of magic. She is going to kiss him free and imprison herself and this is everything he has tried to prevent, this is—

"Come on, Hans," she whispers shakily against his mouth. "Oh, please."

—not working.

She releases him to stare up at his face, hunting for a sign that he is melting. He doesn't feel even a flicker of a heartbeat.

His memory takes him back to a fireplace and a kiss from another sister. _You aren't my true love._

"No!" The expression on Elsa's face disintegrates the sudden barb in his heart. She expected it to work. It should have worked.

" _No!_ " Her voice is anguished. Nothing is working and she has run out of solutions.

She turns to her nemesis. Deprived—or, rather, given—her prize, the snow witch has calmed down. She is watching the tableau with interest, probably collecting inspiration for bribes and punishments to use on future trespassers.

"Why isn't it working?!"

"Motive is everything, darling. They acted out of fear. He acted out of love. Is it a prison if you refuse to leave?"

"I'm acting out of love! Why isn't it taking me instead?"

"One assumes," the witch sounds bored, "that you have more to live for."

In a flash Hans understands: Elsa can't freeze. Or, rather: her heart can't freeze. Everything she does is out of love. Even all those years ago, with Anna, in her fearful solitude, the wholesale icing of Arendelle: the foundation of her fear was love. Fear of hurting the people she loved.

His heart is only full of her, and the magic took it. It feasted on it like yeast on sugar. It's a deceitful, punishing magic. Her unblemished heart is so full of the multitudes of people she loves that the magic can't catch hold.

He wants her as far from its clutches as possible. _Go. Get out of here. Run!_

From the look on her face, the same realizations have struck her. She turns to him, running her eyes over his face, memorizing him. This is goodbye, he realizes. She is finally going to leave. He urges her away even as he drinks in every final second like a scorched desert to waterdrops.

She rests her palm on his cheek and presses her mouth to his for one last heartwrecking kiss. He would give anything to feel it—would give anything to feel the warmth of her one last time, to wrap his arms around her and tell her everything he will never get to say.

"I love you, Hans Westergaard," she whispers.

Then she is sliding away. She walks resolutely toward her parents, her back to Hans.

"Mama, Papa, let's go."

He hasn't given a single thought to her parents until now. They haven't done anything to draw attention to themselves, and when he locates them the reason is instantly clear: they are staring at the snowflakes. Snow materializes out of the air far above their heads and tumbles softly to the ground. Their glossed-over eyes drift from one falling crystal to another. They are oblivious to anything else. Their daughter's voice and touch has no more effect than it did on Hans.

"Why are they like this? He freed them! You have to let them go!"

The snow witch's mouth quirks up. "This isn't part of their punishment. It's an aftereffect. You should have gotten here sooner."

Elsa stands in the center of the hall, surrounded by destruction and rubble, hands empty at her slides. Hans watches it slowly sink in: the realization that she has lost everyone. Her eyes dwell on her father, then her mother, then him.

Her heart can't freeze but it can break. She sinks to her knees with an anguished cry that echoes off the silent white walls. Her head bends to touch the ice floor; her folded hands clutch her heart. The hall is quiet except for the sounds of her shuddering breaths.

Then: a hiss. Like water hitting a hot pan. Like hot tears hitting ice.

Hisses that become splashes.

Elsa stumbles to her feet, startled by the pool of water swirling around her feet. Tears drip off her chin and each one expands to the size of a puddle upon hitting the ground. Melting ice multiplies it and the pool grows like a flood. It spreads across the floor at tsunami speed.

The ice buckles under the stress of the hot water. The floor cracks open like a canyon birthed by an earthquake.

The witch is screaming at her to stop. Elsa looks around, bewildered, as the ice palace begins to collapse. Column bases split and melt and the thick arches topple like trees. Shining water runs down the ice walls. The hall is filling rapidly: the water is already ankle deep.

Elsa runs to her parents and takes them by the hands. She leads them to the entry door, dodging the blocks of ice that are falling from the disintegrating ceiling. Hans watches until she is past his line of sight.

The snow witch is still screaming at the collapsing walls, throwing blasts of ice that seems to get dimmer every time she makes the attempt. She is clearly weakening: her movements are uncoordinated and in her disorientation she keeps running into fallen rubble.

The water is up to her knees.

Finally, off balance, clutching a fallen column, she stumbles and falls. She scrabbles through the swelling water and screams as though it burns. She shrieks as she convulses, and Hans realizes with horror that she, too, is melting—or, rather, her frozen heart.

He is certainly melting too. There is no way to be certain, but if even the witch's columns are susceptible, and he is made of the witch's ice, the conclusion is a simple one. The curse knit into him must be slowing down the erosion.

This is how it ends, then. Not by blade or rope or frozen kiss. Melting in company with the creator of his curse as her lair tumbles down. At least his sentence was a short one. It's a rather unique death; he could have gotten a far less interesting one. He wonders how Elsa is going to explain this to his parents.

A rumble outside: the rest of the castle is falling. He spares a moment of compassion for the sculptures in the other gallery, whose ends will match his. Perhaps, like Elsa's parents, they aren't cognizant enough to know what is happening. He hopes they will be spared more fear, and that if they are still conscious, the end is a welcome one.

The water is up to his waist when there is movement in his periphery: Elsa, fighting her way through the water.

The fool, what is she doing, this place is falling apart!

She wades across the room to him, running in slow motion. The panic on her face answers the question of whether he is melting.

"Let him go!" she screams at the witch, but the other woman is beyond hearing her. The once-imposing figure of the castle's queen is now thawing and undone, crazed and crumbling.

Elsa throws her arms around him. He still can't feel her fingers on his skin. It's agonizing, maddening—the lift of hope that he might have melted enough to have one last touch, one last embrace, one last flicker of her warmth.

She looks desperate. "There has to be a way."

There is. He can feel the curse weakening with the witch. It's loose at the joins. Given time, it will collapse with the castle, but by then he will have melted and merged into the water swirling around them.

Suddenly she looks furious. "It can't have you. You're _mine_." She screams at the crumbling castle: "He's mine! Not hers!" Power flickers across her skin like electricity.

She splays her hands across his chest, above his heart. Tears cluster on her eyelashes. "If you're in there—Hans, please—" He watches her concentrate the way she did when searching for memories in the Mist. She looks him in the eyes.

"My heart is yours… and yours is mine."

And pulls.

He feels pressure in his chest. He feels the ice crystals slide out of his heart, out of his lungs, bowing to her righteous love rage. His arms and legs soften. He can feel his heartbeat. He can feel her warmth.

His head drops onto her shoulder and he collapses into her arms.

"The others," he gasps, trying to fill his lungs. He turns in her arms toward the gallery. It's probably too late.

The water is nearly to his ribs. It's going to cover her shoulders soon.

"Let's go," she says.

The witch screams and stretches a claw after them. Then she disappears beneath the water and doesn't rise again.

*

The water has washed her parents' minds clear. They stand together, hands in each other's, watching the first hint of color enter the sky.

They turn at the sound of footsteps. Elsa throws herself into their arms, trading hugs and kisses and exclamations. They embrace Hans, then move on to the small crowd that has slipped out into dawn and dry land behind their daughter.

Hans pulls Elsa to him and kisses her with his whole heart.

A roar in the distance: the waterfall has melted. Water rushes down the ravine and crashes into the sea. He stands with his arms around Elsa, a hand tucked into one of hers, as wind blows her hair into her eyes. They watch the swans fly away into the goldening gray sky.

*

The ice boat skims effortlessly over the dark sea. Elsa sits with her parents, her hand still in Hans', and tells them the whole story.

The former king and queen of Arendelle have made it clear they have no intention of reclaiming their crowns. Nothing, however, will keep them away from their daughters. After establishing to his satisfaction that their stated love is genuine, Hans leaves the family to talk alone.

The boat is large enough for everyone to splinter into small groups, but the other victims are clustered together, all touching each other in some way: arms pressed to arms, hands tucked in hands, heads on shoulders. He smiles. The universe's most complex, simplest creatures.

From time to time Elsa's voice rises above the sound of the wind and waves. He can hear her now: "I want _answers!_ I love Anna with my entire heart. When I hurt her, I would have done anything to make it right. And then I look at everything you did to me. That's not _love!_ "

Hans keeps his eyes on the horizon.

Eventually she rejoins him. She curls up in his arms, exhausted; they are both too tired to do more than sit in the bottom of the boat and hold each other.

"How are they?"

"Ashamed. Remorseful."

"We all have a lot in common, then."

"I threw a lot at them. Sooner than I meant to. But it all came out in a flood. They've had a lot of time to think about what they've done. We have our work cut out for us, that's certain. But I think there's hope."

"And how are you?"

She takes such a long time to answer that he thinks she might have fallen asleep. Eventually she says, "I thought this… ice... is who I was. It nearly destroyed me. But I overcame it. I made it mine. But it was never mine."

She's half despair, half relief: that it was never her fault. That this part of herself wasn't actually innate, was never meant to be part of her.

"Who am I without this?"

Isn't it obvious? "Love. That big heart of yours, that's what you're made of, Elsa. The ice isn't who you are. It just... reveals who you are." He smiles. "Makes you more visible." She presses a kiss to his cheek in answer and settles against him with a sigh.

This woman. He isn't worthy of her but he wants to try to be. The memory of her falling to her knees will cut him to the heart for a long time to come. He acted to save her life, but he never considered how deeply he would cause her to suffer. He never dreamed she would be leaving with less than he thought he was giving her. He never knew so much of sharing love with someone involved him being present to love.

Her dozing head lolls against his shoulder. He skims his hand over her cheek affectionately and glances past her. The river is a distant thread on the far shore; they are almost to his and Elsa's departure point. Their kiss in the rock valley feels like a lifetime ago.

The Mist must have broken when the fortress melted. He can see a naval ship anchored beyond the dangerous breakers. They must have gotten there via the open waterways. The green coats of Southern Isles soldiers wait on the shore.

The other passengers have noticed as well, and their voices raise with curiosity and interest. The former king kneels beside him. "Hans, refresh my memory. How many men are on that vessel?"

"Five hundred, sir," he answers grimly. He looks behind them as the boat slows.

Elsa's hand tightens around his. Her chin is up; her eyes are ice-bright and fixed on the battleship.

"Don't," he tells her.

"They're not taking you."

"They're good men, Elsa," he says gently. "I'm the attempted murderer. And," he remembers, "fugitive." He reminds her that attacking a foreign battleship would be a huge international incident. She had to sign around a million treaties to never ice her allies. He has made it his business to know the details of the consequences, the primary one being a continent-wide war against Arendelle.

"You're under my jurisdiction. I'll refuse to release you to them. They can't extradite you without my permission. I'll take you home and keep you safe."

He reminds her that doing so will start an international war with the Southern Isles and whoever else wants to join the fun.

"Then we'll hide. No one knows yet that we both survived. My parents and Anna can take care of Arendelle. We can run. We can go anywhere."

"I love that you're willing to do this for me. But I'm not willing to do it to you."

"Please." Her voice breaks. " _Please._ I'm not losing you now, not _now_."

"If there's anything I've learned today," he tells her, tightening his hand around hers, "it's that I must accept the consequences of my actions, no matter whether I'm given justice or mercy."

Dark half-moons sit beneath her eyes, which are welling with tears. He looks at the jagged, perfect pattern of her irises, the length of her lashes, the love alive in those eyes. She is his mirror, committing him to memory during these last precious seconds.

The boat moves forward again.

*

Anna and Kristoff run up to the boat as it beaches. Anna cries, "Elsa, we tried to make them go away but they— _Mama?_ "

The soldiers are ready with shackles. Hans steps off the boat and holds out his arms as Anna bursts into tears.

The metal is freezing around his wrists and ankles. The cold ocean wind wipes away the lingering warmth of Elsa's body but he mentally holds it in place, trying to memorize the pattern it left on his skin. He holds her gaze as they load him onto a boat of their own. He keeps his eyes on her white head, unmoving at the shore's edge, as they cross the tossing waves to the battleship, as the boat is raised to the deck, as he is pulled over the rail.

He is shoved into the brig—dark and damp and stinking of rotting fish—and the key turns in the lock. Four soldiers are stationed outside his cell: two watching the exits and two watching him. There will be no rescue or escape this time.

He leans his head against the wall and closes his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> listen there is little/no precedent for the type of international fracas i've depicted here (at least not that google or wikipedia were able to provide) aside from something called world war 1 that did NOT end with the victim or their country forgiving their assassin, so while it might be more realistic for hans to go home with elsa and not be extradited back to the southern isles, would it really??? i just don't know. frankly i still don't understand why he was sent away from arendelle in f1 to begin with (except i do, because jennifer lee). anyway yes I KNOW i have an unfortunate penchant to go extra on the drama in my finales but i really did try to think through how this might work out re: international affairs. either way there's only one chapter left so go with this.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y'all! i can't believe it has only been 6 weeks since i updated this. the date i posted the last chp - march 14 - was the preface to a whirlwind week that saw me out of town at a work conference on monday and working from home on friday. it feels like that was a year ago. all this to say, it has been an eventful month+ as we all know and i haven't had any time to give this fic until now, so thank you as always for your patience. coincidentally i've spent many hours over the last few weeks studying the mechanics of temperature and salt in relation to ice, so if anyone wants to start a discussion group on that… count me out. i hope all of you and your loved ones are healthy and that if circumstances are bad that they improve soon. there are many far more interesting things currently available to take your mind off things, so thank you for giving your attention to my humble offering ♡  
> OK OVER AND OUT HERE WE GO STORY RESUMING IN THREE

Alone.

Hans had hated the labor camp but even that had been better than the total isolation of prison. After the second day the guards, also bored, start a card game in the better lighting by the ladder to the deck, so there isn't even their uninteresting conversation to listen to.

He sits in the brig and counts the bars of his cell walls. He paces. He does any exercises that don't require contact with the floor beyond that of his boots. He tries to remember every conversation he has ever had with Elsa, every time she has looked at him, every word he has ever heard her speak.

Death has been ready for him for a long time. It seems to be always waiting behind every corner—his death sentence, at the hands of the other prisoners in the labor camp, courtesy of Arendelle's soldiers or its princess, frozen for eternity in a lost ice palace—but somehow he still isn't resigned to it. He wants so badly to live. He wants to know what life looks like when he isn't spending the bulk of his wasting it.

He orders himself to stop being maudlin and morbid (fire and salt, he hasn't even been drinking) but his mind has hours to do nothing but drift.

He reminds himself that not only is Elsa a queen of some renown, she is the accusing victim requesting clemency. How can they refuse her? And hasn't he proved his remorse? Hasn't he delivered the long-lost former monarchs back into the bosom of their people, as he promised? Surely that's enough to free him. It must be enough. The words pump through him in rhythm with his heartbeats: _it must, it must, it must._

He stares at the mildewed boards of the brig ceiling. He remembers the empty, loveless eyes of his father at his sentencing, of his mother's eyes that would not look at him, and thinks: _They have no mercy to give you._

*

The world spins into a whirl of white and green and blue. Everything is both familiar and distant: the blinding sunshine, the crystalline blue water, the heat that sinks in all the way to the bone. He knows the Isles like he knows the placement of his teeth, its warmth has wrapped around him since his first breath—and yet, standing at its doorstep in chains, it receives him as a traitor. No; worse. A stranger. The son it cast out.

Construction has altered the face of the dock, so it takes him a moment to recognize the Royal Harbor. His stomach clenches and his mouth goes dry. The Royal Harbor, not the prison dock. His parents intend to receive him.

He looks around. There is no sign of even a palace servant, let alone a member of the royal family. His heart sinks. They are going to receive him in the Grand Hall.

The Grand Hall is a place of display: a long cavern of a room with tree-tall columns that support a ceiling made of glass. It is the place of weddings and funerals, of knightings and galas, of receptions of foreign dignitaries and, evidently, failed escapees. He can see it already: the long walk from the tall entry doors to the far wall where the twin thrones stand, all the glory of the Isles on display, himself stinking and dirty, hairy and ragged, sunk far from the star he was born under. He will be dragged out before hundreds of court nobles, made into an exhibition before every single person he has ever admired or hated: small, humiliated, friendless, alone.

The hill before him is bright with color and greenery; flowers hide the winding walkway he will take to the top, where the palace sits like the signature jewel in a crown. The entrance to the Grand Hall is visible through the bushes and trees.

Hans looks behind him, wondering if he can make a break for a sailboat. His heart jerks in his chest.

A ship made entirely of ice is docked further down the wharf. His guards grunt in surprise as he comes to a full stop. A woman with hair that shines golden-white in the sunlight is walking toward them.

The soldiers, who have not yet noticed Elsa, tug at him to move. When her presence does register, they begin to chatter inanely. She holds up her hand: a graceful gesture that succeeds in silencing everyone.

His guards are as solid as stone around him. She raises an eyebrow at them. "Step aside, please."

The unit exchanges swift glances. Hans drawls, "Do you really think if she wanted to spring me loose she'd have waited until now?"

They reluctantly break formation. And then she is there, standing in front of Hans without a line of worry on her forehead.

He inhales. "You're here."

"Of course we're here. We were sailing alongside you for the duration of the voyage. I suppose they didn't tell you. How unfortunate." She smiles up at him.

Hans wants to hug her so badly his arms ache from the resistance. Excruciatingly aware of the many eyes and ears on them, they stand like rooted trees, an arm's length from each other. "You're well?" she says quietly.

"I'm well. You're a little green around the gills, Your Majesty. Rough trip?"

"Seasickness has no regard for queenly dignity." She gestures to Anna and Kristoff, who are racing each other up and down the rigging of the ice ship as it lurches back and forth in the waves. "Look at them. She should have been a mermaid."

"A seagull, perhaps." He smiles fondly at the climbers, then gives Elsa a warning look. "If this is your segue into telling me that Anna has secret water powers, I'm escaping to Agrabah next time."

She laughs. "If all goes as planned, you can go to Agrabah without needing to escape at all."

He thinks of the Grand Hall and shakes his head. "I'm an attempted murderer and escaped convict. I'm proof royal blood isn't above the law. There is no mercy waiting for me."

"Not with that kind of attitude. You've been brooding, I see. It's a good thing I'm here to speak on your behalf. You're in a mood to talk yourself right back into the dungeons."

He hears cries of his name: Anna has made it to the crow's nest and spotted him. She and Kristoff wave energetically. Elsa gestures for them to join her.

"My resurrected parents should have stirred up the crowd by now. We had better get in there."

"Your parents are here too?"

"They won't leave us." She tells him Agnarr and Iduna have already gone ahead, accompanied by the bulk of the Arendellian squadron. Hans sees Mattias waiting at a respectful distance. The general nods to him.

His guards look relieved at Elsa's announcement that they should resume their advance toward the palace. They move forward with alacrity. Elsa doesn't even stop to admire any of the stunning flowers that border the walkway. Far too soon Hans finds himself staring at those dreaded double doors, which stand open in the sunshine, the volume high within.

"Ma'am," says the Admiral, gesturing for the queen of Arendelle to go ahead of them.

"You don't understand. His Highness and I are going in together."

"I've been stripped of my titles," Hans reminds her. "No one knows to whom you're referring."

She gives him an unreadable look. "Are you ready?"

He looks at the doors.

Cool fingertips touch his hand. "You sacrificed yourself to an ice witch for me," she says softly. "Will you you fight for your life now? For me?"

He takes a long breath in, looks at her—sunlit and fearless—and squares his shoulders. Elsa waves her hand and her plain sheath dress becomes a glittering gown. They arrange themselves: shoulder to shoulder, regal queen, manacled prisoner.

He pauses at the doorway. "Elsa."

She looks up at him.

"Whatever you hear, whatever they make you think of me... I would do everything differently. Every last thing."

He holds her gaze until she nods.

They step inside together.

The Grand Hall is as shining and beautiful as he remembers. Sunlight falls generously through the high glass ceiling onto the sandstone floor. Bursts of color greet the eye everywhere it looks: climbing plants twine around the columns, flowering trees stretch their branches over the members of the court, who are wrapped in cloths of every dye that exists. A purple rug forms a road that stretches the length of the hall.

Hans wishes he could have witnessed the uproar the arrival of the long-dead king and queen of Arendelle caused in his parents' receiving hall. The Hall is still churning. He can see his parents all the way from the entrance, though their faces are only blurs. Their thrones are empty: all past and current sovereigns of Arendelle and the Southern Isles are clustered together on the dais. His eldest brother and his wife are with them; the rest of his family is scattered at the base of the steps, talking and gesturing at each other. Arendellian military colors mingle with the redheads. Hans mentally congratulates Elsa for effortlessly breaking through the strict formality of the Grand Hall.

There is a dip in volume when he and Elsa are recognized, then it surges again: a wave of questions and confusion that follow them all the way to the dais. Elsa walks the entire length of the hall at his side.

He doesn't look at his brothers, or the courtiers, or Elsa. His eyes are locked on his parents, who watch him silently even as the volume in the hall builds to a crescendo, until he is standing at the base of the dais steps, heart pounding in his ears.

"Mother. Father."

His father growls, "Is anyone going to explain what in God's name happened? I can't get a word of sense from anybody."

"Happily." Elsa steps forward and the hall gradually quietens. "Your Majesties, Your Highnesses, good people of the Southern Isles: as you know, six years ago Hans Westergaard attempted to assassinate me. His sentence was harsh and deserved… but the man before you has, in contrition, done abundant good since that day."

Laying it on thick, Hans thinks. She is going to lose her audience if she keeps this up. No one is here to hear about what a stand up guy he is.

She is careful, however. She doesn't speak of love, doesn't mention friendship, not giving the listeners a single word they might spin into belief that he seduced her, deluded her, manipulated her. She keeps to the strong points and speaks only the truth: how she initially distrusted him; the ways he proved himself trustworthy; the promise he made to retrieve her parents and the sacrificial steps he took to keep it.

She is steady and articulate. She manages to relay the danger and fear of their journey through the Mist and across the sea and through the ice palace's halls without verging into eye-rolling dramatics. Her story elicits murmurs and gasps from the crowd. The king and queen of the Southern Isles listen without expression—a talent they are universally known for.

Anna and Kristoff, never ones for pomp and circumstance, snuck in through the crowd soon after Hans and Elsa's grand entrance. He can hear their whispered critique to his left: _I forgot about the ice manacles. She didn't mention the pancakes. This is my favorite part. I didn't realize his brothers were so tall… and old. I think this is going well, don't you?_

Hans notes the condemnation in the faces around him and is not reassured.

At the end Elsa turns to him. "Do you have anything to add?"

He tells his parents, "All she's said is true." They regard him without blinking.

It's just his and her word. Her parents don't remember anything that happened in the ice palace until the flood that washed their minds clear. The first time they saw Hans was after he was freed from his ice form; everything they know is what they were told. They can't vouch for Elsa's account of the events in the ice palace.

But—to his shock—Mattias steps forward. And Anna, and Kristoff, and then the rest of the Arendellian squadron. Each of them add their voice to Elsa's. They speak for his conduct in the camp, of his determination to redeem himself, of specific actions that spoke to his honesty—things he only vaguely remembers doing, performed outside of his plan to gain their trust without realizing anyone was paying attention.

He is overwhelmed; he listens with rapidly blinking eyes and a tight throat. Everywhere he looks someone else is stepping forward. These people are doing this for him, because they want him alive and free and part of their lives. It is humbling beyond belief.

The final voice is a man's: clear and deliberate, and so quiet everyone leans in to hear him. The former king of Arendelle is speaking.

"Bruno. Hilde. The fact is simple: we have all done unworthy things we would undo if we could. No, it is even simpler than that: I owe your son my life. If you insist on executing him, I must take his place on the beheading block."

Hans' head jerks up, but Agnarr is not looking at him. He is looking at Elsa.

The Grand Hall is in uproar, but Hans already knows no decision will be made today. It is a point of pride to the king and queen of the Southern Isles that they are known for being fair and just. They prefer to make use of legislative order when possible, especially in cases where they may be biased. A new hearing to tack on his new transgressions would have been scheduled regardless. With the Queen of Arendelle determined to speak as a witness, the date is set for the next day.

*

The High Court.

The same courtroom. The same assembly of lords. The same steely-faced judge. The same major players giving a new witness. Hans lives a year in a week.

Elsa only stands witness once—a lengthier repeat of her Grand Hall presentation—but she is there every day, sitting with her family in the observers' balcony where he can see her. Hans is examined and cross-examined. He keeps his eyes on her every time he feels he's starting to drown.

The death penalty is removed from his sentence. Evidently his parents are as unwilling to start an international incident by executing Arendelle's former sovereign as Hans was to run away with her current one.

"The apple doesn't fall far," she notes.

"That's not what they said six years ago." Elsa frowns at him, but Anna laughs.

He isn't allowed visitors but they let him take a walk in the lower gardens once a day. Without fail, Elsa meets him there, usually with Anna and Kristoff in tow. The first time this happens, Elsa argues with the guards for a full twenty minutes before they let her speak to him without their supervision. Cut from an entirely different cloth than the Navy are the palace dungeon guards. Hans is fairly certain they want him to try to run, if only for the opportunity to hunt him down. Escaping from the labor camp was easy once the plan was in motion. There was a reason he never tried to escape from the dungeons.

Anna has a plan if the result of the trial is a disappointment: "We'll just tell them he's got to serve the rest of his sentence in Arendelle. And he has to be Elsa's…"

"Lifelong butler," Kristoff suggests.

Anna screws up her face at him in repugnance. " _Bodyguard_."

"Get real! No one in that courtroom would ever trust him to be her bodyguard!"

"You think a _butler_ is more romantic than—"

They argue their way down the stretch of the path. Hans glances at Elsa, who is smiling gently, then at the distant guards, who can't see below the waist-high azaleas. He reaches for her hand and she twines her fingers through his.

*

The re-trial moves quickly, given that all the Arendelle royals have descended on the Southern Isles due to it, but for some the deliberation is still too slow.

Eight days pass without a decision. The royal sisters meet him in the gardens on the morning of the ninth. Elsa's eyes are red-rimmed and bloodshot. Her face is drawn. His heart goes cold.

Her eyes widen. "No! No, it's not that." She reaches for his hands. "I have to leave. We have to return home. I don't want to, but with word spreading that my parents are alive, I've delayed it too long already."

"Of course. I understand."

"It's killing me to go. I feel like I'm abandoning you."

"Elsa, love. The fact that you're here at all has done more for me than you know."

"I'm terrified to let you out of my sight," she confesses. "What if they sentence you to something awful and I'm not here to stop it?"

A voice calls Elsa from across the gardens: Mattias, who waves an arm to beckon her. "Give me a moment," she tells Hans. "Your parents and I are updating our peace treaty to include you and, well, complicated is one word for it." She steps away.

Anna clears her throat meaningfully. "She's not leaving you entirely without a sleigh on the mountainside."

"You're staying?"

"If you'll accept sloppy seconds. Kristoff too. Less sloppy. Very hairy."

"Anna." He's so touched he doesn't know how to adequately say it. "You're going to miss the party," he points out.

"I _am_ the party," she retorts.

"Thank you."

She shows him the warm Anna smile that so resembles her sister's but is somehow uniquely hers. "Life is crazy, huh?"

He smiles back. "That's one word for it."

*

Hans doesn't believe in coincidence, but it seems a bit much that his release is granted two days after Elsa leaves.

The judge reads out the pardon. Anna and Kristoff leap from their seats, whooping. His brothers embrace him—not without awkwardness, but with expressions of gladness he can't doubt. He wonders whether they are glad he is free or simply relieved to have the stain removed from the family line.

The king and queen have never been demonstrative parents. "Son," says his father, giving his hand a stiff shake. Her mother glances at his unkempt beard and kisses his temple.

Then he is pulled back into the throng of extended family and suddenly surfaced friends to get his back thumped and hand pumped. He is pummeled with congratulations and questions. He fixes a smile on his face and lets them swarm him until he is able to make his escape.

"If you'll excuse me," he declares. "I have something urgent to see to."

Outside, the bright blue sky wraps around him like an embrace, like a shout of jubilation. The birds and scents and colors fill all the hollows of his heart, familiar yet shining as though brand new, freedom making everything brighter.

The stable smells just the same: straw and manure and sweet horse breath. Sunlight falls in the old familiar arcs across the floor. The sound of his boots clicking on the flagstones takes him back to when he was six years old and first learning to ride, overwhelmed by the stables and the size of the horses but elated all the same.

He stops at a stall halfway down the shedrow. His fingers trace the nameplate on the door. Gigantic dun hindquarters greet his eyes; the other end is busy at the feed box.

Hans whistles softly. The stallion's head lifts. He looks over his shoulder and nickers a question.

"How are you, boy? Miss me?"

Black eyes brighten with recognition. A moment later Sitron's head is over the stall door, bobbing and whuffing, butting at him with violent affection. Hans opens the door and finds himself nearly bowled over by a thousand pounds of Fjord stallion.

Horse prances in place, nuzzling the man; man clings to the horse, eyes streaming tears. Sitron's nose is white with age and he couldn't make a trek past mountain foothills today, but he smells like _Sitron_.

Eventually the stallion settles, snorting happily against Hans' shoulderblade and occasionally knocking the back of Han's head with his jaw. Hans leans against him and breathes slowly. Peace sinks in and spreads through his body. Heart to fingertips, just like the old days.

It was always Sitron—steady, trusting, comforting—who made him believe he could keep going during the dark times, that there was light waiting around the corner. Hans had only to touch him to know he was safe, for fear and doubts to vanish.

Now he stands pressed to the warmth of the same dun coat and for the first time in years he finally believes everything is going to be alright.

*

His brothers look just the same. Some are a little hairier, some a little fatter. Most have married; they've accumulated more children than Hans can count. He notes with satisfaction that the Westergaard genes make a good showing in the next generation. He is grateful for his nieces' and nephews' existence, though he couldn't care less about them individually: they provide an easy topic of conversation for a group of brothers who aren't sure how to speak to him.

He wants to spend time with them, though. He wants brothers. He could never hold their attention as a child or a young man; years in prison certainly didn't help build any bonds. So he stays, and he makes an effort. It isn't that different from his attempts to get on the good side of the labor camp guards or the Arendellian soldiers. He is charming and attentive and ingratiating. He is surprised to find that his audience is eager to be charmed. They want to make up for the years lost, too.

Slowly but surely everyone relaxes. Common ground is found. Tentative bonds form. For the first time in his life it feels as though they are meeting as equals.

Anna and Kristoff are happy to stay—Anna for the fact that a holiday in foreign palace means hundreds of new people to meet, Kristoff for the fact that no one in the Southern Isles knows him, not to mention the fact that both arrived and immediately fell in love with the sun. They can often be found in the most verdant part of the palace gardens or sunniest stretch of beach, basking with their faces pointed heavenward, sugar-rum drinks close at hand. Hans is grateful beyond measure for their presence. They are the ones winking at him across the room when he's asked for the hundredth time to tell the story of the battle against the ice witch; they are the ones who, despite the bloodlines in the room, feel like family.

*

His parents have as little time for him as they do the rest of their sons. It has always been so and always will be. Duty comes first; they run a busy country that survives on trade, and it occupies the bulk of their attention and energy.

They hold a supper for the prodigal son. It's more than he expected from them. He attends various diplomatic events simply to be near them. Most are dull, but his attention is occupied by his parents' poker faces. What would break that facade? He would give a great deal to know.

"They'll never be who you want them to be," his eldest brother tells him—kindly, with eyes that understand. "Their failures aren't your fault. They love you, they really do, but this is all the love they're capable of showing."

"Summoning," Hans corrects, not without bitterness.

Axel shrugs. "Either way. Don't waste years of your life waiting for them to change, like I did. There's a lot of love in the world, Hans... so many people who will love you, so many who already do… and in your own heart, ready to give." He says slyly, "Queen Elsa is rather lovely, eh?"

Hans elbows him in the side but only succeeds in eliciting a laugh.

*

He goes to the harbor and watches the ships arrive and depart. He listens to the shouts of the sailors as they move cargo. Above him white clouds coil and unfurl. The island water shines as though diamonds have been strewn across it.

He breathes the wild ocean winds and soaks his skin in sunshine. He sits in the shade beneath the vivid green foliage and he roams the market streets. He swims and sails and goes fishing with his brothers and their countless offspring. He bathes daily and rides Sitron and watches the sunset whenever he wants to. He lays on his balcony at night and stares at the star-full sky.

The wind tying knots in his hair, the screaming gulls, the sunlight dancing over his face: he wishes he could gather it in his hands and press it into his heart.

"I think," he tells Anna, "it's time to leave."

*

"Sitron is coming with us, right? Whew. Sven was so worried he wouldn't."

Hans stares at Kristoff. He wonders if he is going to spend the rest of his life wondering if he is an unwilling participant in an elaborate practical joke.

"Sure," he says, and could swear the reindeer smiles at him.

*

Dawn lightens the world before them. The sea stays dark; the sun is hidden behind the looming fjord walls that surround the distant city. Pale gray sky slowly transforms to rose-colors. Clouds mimic a line of mountains, burnished gold where they pile up in the sky. The wind off the ocean is cool.

"Wait for it," says Anna.

Prepared, Hans knows the instant the ship is sighted on the horizon: a flash of white appears at one of the castle towers. More flashes appear on the water, moving rapidly toward the ship, disappearing almost as soon as they are made.

Anna grins. "Let me know when it's over," she tells him, and vanishes into the rigging behind the mainsail.

Elsa runs across the water with a smile on her face that the sun itself will be hard pressed to outshine. She flings out a burst of ice that becomes a ramp, skids up it to the rail, and throws herself into his outstretched arms.

Hans seizes her in a hug so tight he swings her off her feet. He'll kiss her in a moment but right now all he wants is to hold her, wrap himself around the warm living life of her, feel her heart beat hard and fast against his chest.

It's her mouth that eventually finds his. His lips part for her, kissing her back with all the hunger and happiness born of many weeks separated and finally reunited, not breaking apart until they hear dog-whistles from the direction of the crow's nest.

He smiles down at her and brushes her wild morning hair out of her eyes. "How has it been?"

"Good," she says. "Hard. Easy. Tricky. My parents want to help but they instinctively turn controlling. I want their advice but only when I ask for it. We're only a month in. We'll figure it out. But I'm tired."

"How did the people take it?"

"Oh, happy they're alive, of course. A lot of people loved my parents and their deaths were so tragic. The celebration parades and galas went on for a week. But you were right—there's definitely a sense everyone is glad I'm retaining the throne." She turns pink with pleasure.

"It's always nice to be wanted." He runs a light thumb over the shadows under her eyes. "Are the galas over now?"

"I've been overdoing it, I know. They've been a good distraction from missing you."

"Anna will want another week's worth," he warns her.

"I've saved her one or two. She'll want her time with my parents first. I've had them all to myself for weeks now, I feel a little guilty. But it's been nice."

His smile deepens in response to hers. "Catching up?"

"And acquiring some very good legislative information. For example, did you know that the man I marry need not ever be more than a consort?"

All the air leaves his lungs. He feels suddenly light, as though if he lets go of her the wind might carry him away. Happiness spreads out through his limbs. The relief is almost blinding. "Not a king at all."

"Not even close."

"Do you have any candidates for the position?" he asks, unable to restrain the smile threatening to engulf his face.

She breathes, "Yes," and leans forward and kisses him, and his soul soars and twists and explodes into rainbow shards. He loves her and she loves him and they _can_. There's a future for them—against all odds, a future: real and liveable and not just a dream, more than a hope. He'll have her by his side, in his arms, in his heart. He'll have a home and all the meanings it carries. The whisper turns into a shout; the slim ribbon of stars bursts into a universe.

She is watching his face. Tears are welling in her eyes.

He presses a kiss to the back of her hand and murmurs against her skin, "I'm going to make sure everyone knows that _you_ proposed to _me_."

She laughs and the tears escape to cluster on her eyelashes. She takes his face in both her hands and presses a smiling kiss to his mouth.

"Yes, and yes, and yes ad infinitum," he tells her, "in case you missed it."

"I did get that impression," she says. She slides her arms around his waist and lays her head on his chest. He is simultaneously flooded with both affection and amusement; he wouldn't put it past her to fall asleep on him.

"It's a terrible example to set for the children, you know. 'Your attempted murderer may be your future husband' and all that."

"Which children?"

"Which—Our children, who else?"

She is silent for a moment. "Our children," she says, wonder in her voice.

"Going to need at least five of them to be redheads if we're going to establish a proper ginger footing in this country."

"Vetoed," she retorts. "You and Anna are about as much ginger as I can handle."

He laughs against her spider-silk hair and tightens his arms around her. He can feel her heartbeat, still going faster than usual.

Her heart to care for, her heart to fill.

Life, he thinks, is crazy, the way everyone wanders through it trusting each other and trying not to hurt each other and sometimes hurting each other intentionally and sometimes unintentionally, and despite it most people choose to trust each other to not do any real damage despite how much easier it is to hurt and get hurt than otherwise, because they know it is still better to keep their hearts open and soft than locked away and invulnerable. As though they're all born knowing they can't do anything good if they're heartless. That love is the only thing that can truly save anyone. Some days it looks like fearlessness facing down a swordpoint. Sometimes it means becoming a safety net or a resting place or simply walking alongside each other in trust.

Elsa smiles against his chest. They are sailing though the pass that divides the open ocean from the bay. The waves and wind are loud around them and he shouldn't be able to hear her words but they reach him all the same.

"Almost home."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that's a wrap! hope you enjoyed it! stay safe and healthy!!!!!


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